Sink or Swim
by ericajanebarry
Summary: After Downton Cottage Hospital was acquired by The Royal Yorkshire, Doctor Richard Clarkson took his cue and moved on. Happy and fulfilled in his new position, he hasn't looked back. What will happen when he crosses paths with Isobel Grey, Baroness Merton? Consider this my take on how the film should go. *Now rated M*
1. Storm Warning

**A/N: As one might surmise, I am not psyched about the Downton film. I won't rain on the parade for those of you who are, but in return I ask that you be gentle with me. I'm struggling with whether to write at all anymore and find that I get antsy when I don't and there's an idea burning me up inside. So.**

 **I haven't written a period piece for Richobel in a couple of years, because the modern iteration of them is just so natural to me. But then this idea was born, and it is a living, breathing, very organic thing. At least for now. I can't be certain of the timeline for the film yet, but everyone seems to be talking like it's about five years post-S6. So that's where we begin. Consider this how I would have the film go. Sorry this first bit is short. Be well, and please let me know what you think!**

 **xx,  
~ejb~**

* * *

He is positively struck dumb when it finally happens, even though he's looked over his shoulder every day for the last five years, certain their paths would cross sooner or later. As much as York has grown since the War, it is no London, after all. And since the merger went forward, it really is quite remarkable that he has neither seen nor heard anything of her or from her in all this time.

Of course, that's mainly down to his choices: having left Downton before the ink was dry on the merger agreement, for starters, and then taking a lucrative position at a teaching hospital in Leeds for three years. It had been a wise move for him; far enough away that he was guaranteed neither to be preceded by his reputation nor to come into contact with his betrayers.

Indeed, that is precisely how he had thought of her in the wake of Downton Cottage Hospital's acquisition by the Royal Yorkshire. Her poncey wet blanket of a husband and Lady Grantham hadn't escaped this low valuation either, but it cut to the core of his being because it was _she_ who had led the charge. Accordingly, Leeds had been a bid for self-preservation, and it had worked a trick. He'd found himself so preoccupied, between teaching seminars on infectious disease, seeing patients at his private surgery, and giving at least twenty hours a week to the hospital, that, over time, the bitterness of losing his career post of forty years and the torment of knowing he'd lost _her_ to that pompous dullard had receded into the background. Days became weeks that stretched into months with hardly a thought of his former life.

And so, when he was asked to consider the position of chief of surgery at the Royal Yorkshire Hospital, he'd had no reservations about saying yes. He was working well, and he was happy. The days of hearkening to the whims of the Crawley family under the auspices of deference were well over.

Suddenly, with a wayward glance, it is thrust upon him once again.

 **oOo**

It is that part of spring that dawns cold and glistening but warms by noon, teasing the summer that is to come. He doffs his white coat whilst walking through the courtyard on his way from the surgical wing back to his personal office. It's almost time to dust off the rod and reel and try his luck with the trout, he thinks. Perhaps he'll tie some flies at the weekend.

It's her laugh that grabs his attention. He'd know that sound anywhere. He ducks behind a column and turns in the direction from which the cachinnation came. Indeed, it is she, chatting to the chairman of the hospital's board of directors. She; cool and elegant in that plummy shade of merlot that was always so becoming on her, despite it being the uniform of half-mourning.

 _Who has died?_ he wonders, then swiftly chides himself. What does he care? _Clearly it's one of the family._ The family; the Brutus to his Caesar. _Keep walking, man. There is no good that can come of this. None whatever._ _ **None.**_

She is moving closer now; his best chance at avoiding being seen is to double back, and he does. But it's too late. He hears her take her leave of the chairman, and then, behind him:

"Dr. Clarkson? Is it you?"

 _Caught. Like a rabbit in a snare._ There is nothing for it but to concede defeat. He turns, steels himself. Aims for a smile, managing at least (he hopes) a visage of neutrality.

His first glimpse of her, close enough to count the lines around her eyes, knocks the breath from his lungs. She is a stunner, as ever; the years have been kind. She is …

 _Poison. The cruellest kind of heartless b—_

"Lady Merton," he manages, and it's all he can say. He chokes on the words. He'd nearly slipped and called her _Mrs. Crawley,_ and it takes him back to their first meeting.

" _Well, Mrs. Crawley, I have a feeling we will sink or swim together."_ She hadn't been _his_ then; she never was. Never _would have been_ even if they had ever got together. No, indeed; she was something far superior in those halcyon days. She was _Isobel._ Her own woman. Obstinate; impassioned. A visionary. He had held onto so many fond memories of the way she used to be, but they'd long since become raw wounds.

As she stands before him now, he finishes the thought:

 _And she is the salt._


	2. Your long-time curse hurts

**A/N: Thanks for the love, everybody. Here's the next bit. Writing angry!Richard makes my heart pound. I take the task of giving him a voice incredibly seriouly. Be well, all!**

 **xx,  
** **~ejb~**

* * *

Sound, thundering like a steam train, rings in his ears, pounding in time with his pulse. Echoes of the things they'd said to one another over the years; an indistinguishable jumble:

—" _Well, it is her house."_

" _Does that mean she's suddenly received medical training? Or are you like everyone else in thinking that, because she's a countess, she has acquired universal knowledge by divine intervention?"_

—" _I have to go where I am useful. And that place, I'm afraid, is no longer Downton Abbey."_

" _You'll be missed."_

" _By you, possibly. I hope so, anyway. But not, I think, by Lady Grantham."_

—" _I sometimes forget, when we meet in the_ _splendour_ _of the abbey, that you were a doctor's wife. That you know what my life consists of in a way that no one else does …"_

" _It's a relief to be able to talk without having to explain oneself, isn't it?"_

" _A relief, and a privilege. And I hope we can do it again. Soon."_

—" _I'd be interested to know … if you've ever thought of marrying again."_

" _Are you thinking of getting married, Dr Clarkson? Because if you are, you're a better man than I am, Gunga Din."_

" _Why?"_

" _Well, with good friends like you, I enjoy my life as it is, and I wouldn't want to risk things by changing it."_

He is looking at her. She is saying something to him, but the pandemonium inside of his head is all he can hear. He feels his knees beginning to buckle, a cold sweat breaking out.

She touches his wrist. "Dr. Clarkson, are you quite well?" He sees her frown, and her concern almost touches him. Until he remembers that as a nurse, it's second nature for her to respond if she perceives distress in others.

" _I wouldn't want to risk things by changing it."_

It's not a personal gesture at all.

"Yes, quite," he replies abruptly. "Only I have a lecture this afternoon and I need to review my notes beforehand so as to avoid making a hash of it."

Is that shock he registers in her expression? Surely she can't have expected them to reunite as friends.

He's never been the vindictive sort, but he can't help thinking:

 _Now you know how it feels to be dismissed._

"I'll go with you," she tells him. It's not an offer; it's something she has resolved, and in response he does something he hasn't had occasion to do in years.

He rolls his eyes at her.

 **oOo**

He should say _something_ to her, shouldn't he? He can be civil even if his thoughts toward her are bordering on the murderous.

"What brings you to York?" He feels he's adequately genuflected already and omits her title this time.

She doesn't quite smile, but she appears relieved that he has addressed her.

"I had a meeting with the board of directors to learn how my skills might be of use to the hospital." She casts her gaze downward momentarily, and when she meets his eyes again he sees a flash of … something. Discomfort, he thinks; beyond that it isn't clear. "Now that I've got time on my hands again."

Ah. "Lord Merton?" he asks.

She nods. "It's been about eighteen months. Complications of pneumonia. He'd just got back on his feet after the anemia." She looks at him directly. "You were right that it wouldn't kill him, but it certainly did weaken his constitution. We were both taken ill with bronchitis, but I rallied rather quickly." With a shrug, she concludes, "He didn't."

He stops walking; they've reached the building that houses his office. He does not ask her in. "I'm sorry," he tells her. It's all he can manage, but it is sincere. Lord Merton was far from his best mate, but he would never wish him dead.

"That's kind of you to say." A smile that doesn't reach her eyes. He used to know what each of her facial expressions meant, and if he can still read her (why should he have any interest in reading her?) this one looks a whole lot like regret. _Interesting._ (He secures his inner armour.) But it does not move him.

She is speaking again. Awfully chatty considering the state in which they left things, he thinks, but then she was always going to say her piece or die trying. "It's probably for the best." He senses that she's waiting for him to engage her. He doesn't. _He can't._ If that's ill-mannered, he reckons he can be forgiven.

Some things must truly never change, however, because she ploughs on despite his silence, even if it is done with reticence. "I don't think I made him happy," she confesses quietly.

And, damn him, his instinct is to pacify her. "I'm sure that isn't true." How would he know, and what should he care?

She won't be deterred. "He was in love with the idea of me. However he got it into his head that I'd be passive and docile —the perfect society wife—, (he almost snorts aloud at this) he found out straightaway that I wasn't."

What is he supposed to do with this information? "All the same, you were with him to the end. I'm sure that was a great comfort." This affirmation costs him nothing. He has seen her way with patients, and it reaches beyond competence. She possesses a genuine empathy well-suited to those in her care.

Her countenance has gone stony, her eyes clouded. "That's as may be. It certainly taught me a thing or two about myself." She doesn't wait for his prompting to continue. "I suppose I was in love with the idea of being useful. When we thought that he had pernicious anemia; when I whisked him away from Larry and that wretched Amelia, it was all quite thrilling. I had a purpose once again; I could save him. And then suddenly we were married and I realised my mistake."

He shifts uneasily from one foot to the other; withdraws his pocket watch; checks the time. As he replaces the watch he sighs, rubbing his forehead. "I'm not sure I understand why you're telling me all of this."

He watches her flinch, and for an instant he almost regrets his words. But she had shown no regard for him when last they'd known one another, and though he has always been a forgiving sort, he is no pushover.

"I married a man I didn't love, and burned bridges in so doing. I loved someone else, and my behaviour towards him was abhorrent. There's nobody to blame but myself for that. Being needed is not the same as being known. By the time I recognised that, the damage had been done."

"And still I wonder: why are you saying this to me?"

Her eyes shimmer with tears threatening to spill over. "It's you I love. It always has been. But you'd never have known it by my actions."


	3. Images and words are running deep

**A/N: I continue to be amazed and so encouraged by your enthusiasm for this story. Thank you all for the reviews, reblogs and recs. I have the best readers ever!**

 **xx,**  
 **~ejb~**

* * *

There are those people who, having just heard a confession the likes of hers, would faint dead away. He has never been that sort, but he finds himself wishing that he was, that he could black out and feel nothing instead of the sudden, intense anger that rises up in him.

"What did you say?" he practically roars. They're going to make a scene if this continues. While it wouldn't be the first time, he won't allow it to happen. Not here, on _his_ territory.

"I said that I'm in love with you, and that I always have been." How can she stand there, so calm and self-composed? She has just turned his life upside down!

"No! No, you've no right to say that to me! Not after …"

"After what?" Her voice is a whisper, but she doesn't appear fazed by his reaction.

He scowls, pressing his palm to his forehead, and scans their surroundings. He was never going to have this conversation. _(Hell's bells,_ he was never going to see her again!) He is most certainly not going to have it in a public courtyard. He opens the door to the building and waves her inside reluctantly. Retrieving the key from the pocket of his white coat, he unlocks his office door. They step inside. The door closes behind them, and his stomach churns.

He should suggest she sit down, and there is a chair just across the desk from the one he usually sits in that he placed there for just such an occasion. But he makes no such invitation, instead pacing frenetically between the desk and the door.

She watches him, her brow furrowing. "Dr. Clarkson … _Richard,_ I can see I've upset you. I assure you I didn't come here with that intention. I didn't even know you were here. I—"

" _Stop!"_ he barks. "Stop talking, this instant! You said it all; you didn't _know._ You _don't_ know anything about me or my life now, because you sold me down the river and ran me out of Downton —my home of _forty years_ — without a thought for anyone but yourself. You don't get to come here, waltz back into my life and say you love me, when every one of your actions points to the fact that you don't!"

He expects her to argue, to have a corresponding rebuttal for each of his points. She doesn't. Instead she stands behind the chair with her hands resting on the back of it, watching him. The next time he walks past, she touches his shoulder.

He stops. Stands toe-to-toe and looks at her.

"I know," she tells him quietly but levelly. "You're right. I'm sure that nothing I can offer by way of explanation will erase the pain I've put you through. I can assure you that I've relived it every day since you left, and I've been just … _sick_ about it. I would take it all back in a heartbeat if I could. I told you what's in my heart because I thought that I'd never have the chance. I never expected I'd see you again, but I made up my mind that if I ever did, I would tell you the truth. I don't expect it to make any difference at all. But you should know that you did nothing to deserve such malice."

He is gobsmacked. He thinks that he sees genuine contrition in her eyes. At least, that's what the sorrow currently reflected in them would have meant when he used to know her.

Does he know her now? Can he; does he even want to? So many questions battle for primacy. He has answers for none of them. Can he forgive her? Can he even allow the conversation to continue? He's got a job he loves now, in which he has a fair degree of autonomy. A house that he owns, free and clear. For the first time in his life, he alone is in control of his fate. None of this would have come to be had the situation not become intolerable in Downton. Perhaps, in an odd way, he has her to thank for his present circumstances. But does that mean that it's wise to let her in again?

He doesn't know, doesn't know, doesn't know. His head is spinning again, and beginning to throb. "I need to sit down," he says, not particularly directed at her.

She scurries around the desk to pull out his chair for him lest he collapse. "Can I get you anything? A glass of water, perhaps a headache powder?"

"Please." He nods, and it occurs to him that he's feeding her _hauteur,_ her need to be needed. And isn't that exactly what created the beast? But maybe, just maybe, it's an entrée; her chance to prove true all that she's just laid before him.

One thing is certain: she knows her way round a physician's office. It helps that he's set this one up not dissimilarly to the one they shared for years in Downton. A quick nip into the supply closet and she's back, setting a glass before him. "I gave it a good stir," she tells him. "It's a pity they haven't hit upon a way to make these more palatable."

"Thank you," he says earnestly, mindful to look her in the eyes. He gasps when he does so. He has caught her extending —and then immediately thinking better of it and withdrawing— her hand to touch her palm to his forehead. Like mothers do. Like _lovers_ do.

He can assume all the ill motives his mind can construe about her, but he cannot put this gesture down to anything but love.

He can't quite believe it when he hears himself saying, "It's alright."

There are miles to go before he will know whether there is any kind of future for them. A yawning chasm of bad blood between them and trust that must be rebuilt brick by brick if they're even to be friends.

But for now, he permits her touch; leans his forehead into the palm of her hand. Instantaneously the years, along with all the pain they've brought with them, fall away.

He does not know what will become of him. Her. _Them._ But he believes that she loves him, despite all of her faults.

And in this moment, it's enough.


	4. It's a matter of trust

Eventually he becomes aware of the fact that she is still touching him, and that he's still vacillating between rage and shock at the fact that she's turned up, effectively, on his doorstep. He has been consumed every day for the last five years with trying to forget her. Now that she is here before him, he is no less hurt. By her rejection of his attempts to comfort her in the wake of her son's death, by her blatant disregard for his loss of power in ceding control of Downton Cottage Hospital to the Royal Yorkshire. By the cold shoulder that she gave him when he asked about her interest in remarrying, and the nail that she pounded into his veritable coffin by marrying Dickie Merton. A man who didn't even know that she'd lost her son, yet who swore that he loved her.

But she had admitted her wrongdoing and laid herself bare when she said that she knew her apology may not change anything, and that even still, she loved him.

It is not a question, for him, of whether he loves her. He could no sooner change that than change the fact that the sky is blue. But he does not know whether he can afford to risk the contentment he has found, and let her get close again. He is terrified at the depths to which he sank in the aftermath, in the wake of her betrayal. He could have drunk himself to death when it was all still raw. He'd entertained the notion more than once. She has proven that she has the capacity to wound him like no other.

He takes hold of her hand and moves it to rest on the wooden surface of his desk. She looks at him with an edge of fear in her eyes. (He hates it that she seems afraid of him, how he'll react. Even if the very least she deserves is a proper dressing down.) He does not move his own hand away, instead leaving it there, the tips of his fingers _just_ managing not to touch hers. She had extended the olive branch to him, and even if he is caught on the back foot by it all, he can return the gesture. Because he loves her, after all.

Even after it all.

"What do you want, Isobel?" He doesn't mean to sound so put out; it's more that the unexpectedness of the last half hour's events has taken its toll on him.

She studies his features for a long moment. "Nothing," she starts to say, and then doubles back. "I _expect_ nothing. I can only imagine what this must be like for you. It's clear that by coming here I've reopened old wounds. I'll leave, Richard. You'll never have to see me again."

He is a man. A doctor, and a soldier; tears are not a part of his vocabulary. Yet now he feels the salty sting at the outer corners of his eyes. As much as he has at times, over the years, thought it only just that she should be suffering miserably for her choices, he takes it all back now that he sees it played out. He simply loves her too much to turn a blind eye to her anguish, even if he doubted countless times whether he would survive his own.

He sniffs; clears his throat. Shakes his head. "It wouldn't be right to ask that of you." His countenance brightens a little when he tells her, "Besides, you still haven't answered my question." It's not quite a smile, but almost, and she mirrors the expression, the both of them thinking how his last remark harks back to old times.

"I _want_ …" she sighs, "... I want to turn back time and take back every cruel word I said to you." She casts her eyes downwards, silent for a long moment as she thinks. "There are so many things I'd change, if I could go back." When her eyes meet his again they are clouded with pain. He remembers that look. He _hates_ it, what it stands for.

"Matthew," he says, and she nods.

"I went mad after I lost him, Richard." Her eyes are so clear, so earnest. His heart hurts. "As I said before, there is no excuse. But it's the only way that I can rationalise the woman I became. Looking back now I don't even recognise her. I wanted putting away, I think, but it wouldn't have been obvious to any but the sharpest observer." A long look into his eyes and then, "Is that what you thought?"

"Is it really wise to revisit those times?" It's a deflection, and if she calls him on it, he won't deny it. If they're ever to find a way forward, there is nothing for it but to do exactly that. But his default is now to self-protect, and if she's going to spend any time around him at all, she'll have no choice but to accept it.

"I'm sorry. I've dropped enough in your lap today. I really should be getting back." She rises to leave.

He stops her with a hand on her wrist. "It's been a long five years, Isobel. We're both of us different people than we used to be. I can't speak for you, but it's going to take time before I can be sure of the best course of action. I don't mean to make you suffer. It's clear you've put yourself through enough of that already."

He's still got hold of her wrist and her arm goes limp as her defences relax. Anyone would think she was starved for touch, or that she had browbeaten herself into thinking she deserved a heavy hand from him. If he knows her at all, there's a great deal of truth in both assumptions.

"I understand, as well as I can do." She offers him a smile, minuscule but genuine. "You look well, Richard. Whatever it is that you're doing now, it suits you. I can't tell you how much that pleases me."

He squeezes her hand in thanks and then sits down again. She follows his lead (there's a first time for everything, it would seem). If she can display such vulnerability in spite of her fears, he reckons he can give a little as well. "It's been a long road," he confesses. "Plenty of wrong turns along the way. Bit of an odd thing starting anew at this late hour, but it seems to have come out alright."

"How wonderful for you, truly." Her expression, if he had to label it, speaks of pride. Pride _in him._ Over the course of this reunion he has yet to witness even a hint of selfishness in her. He's beginning to feel a bit uncharitable.

"You mentioned getting back. Are the family sending a car, or—"

"No, no," she cuts in. "I'm … um … I no longer live at Crawley House." At his shocked look she gives a tiny, mirthless laugh. "I know, it's rather unexpected."

A sudden feeling of protectiveness rises up in him. "Have the family put you out?"

She reads his posture and it makes her smile. "Oh, goodness, no. It's nothing like that. There's simply nothing keeping me in Downton anymore. And far too many ghosts."

He understands. Wants to comfort her. To take her into his arms. But that's not where they are yet, and she's rejected the shoulder he offered her once before.

"Master George must be away at school then." He knows that she would never leave if her grandson were still at home.

She nods, and there's that look of pride again. "Off to Eton, like his father. And doing very well, from the sounds of it. He's only aged nine, of course, but he already says that he intends to read medicine."

He grins at this. "Lad's not enamoured of the high life, eh? He sounds every bit his father's son."

This time she laughs a bit in earnest, and it's music to his ears. "The title will convey, of course, whether he likes it or not. He may be only young, but he's got a good head on his shoulders. I see him being a trailblazer. Changing the face of the aristocracy; making it accessible."

It's his turn to look at her fondly. "That wouldn't surprise me one wit. But what of you? Now that you've left the village, I mean?"

There comes over her features a look of pure exhilaration. "It's a bit of an unknown, you see. I've taken a room in a guesthouse in the high street …"

"Here?" he interjects. "In York?"

Nodding, she goes on. "Yes, and the hospital board here have asked me to teach a course in nursing. Of course it's not as straightforward as all that; there's a clinical requirement for teaching staff as you know. And nursing is becoming more regulated now, so they want me certified before I make a proper start. Imagine it: revising for examinations at my age!" She laughs again and shakes her head and it's reminiscent of the Isobel of old. He'd forgotten how pretty she is when she's happy. It's an altogether separate thing to her beauty; she was breathtaking even in the depths of her mourning for Matthew.

"It's all just formalities," he assures her. "You'll do brilliantly. That is, of course, assuming you accept what they've offered."

"Do you think I should?"

"That's not for me to say. I mean, we hardly know each other now."

Her countenance falls at that. "Yes. Quite."

He didn't intend to spoil the mood. "But if I had to go by the look on your face when you were telling me about it, I think you'd be doing yourself a disservice if you didn't try."

"I suppose that I'll reassess my living arrangements once I see how it all shakes out."

He is impressed. "It's terribly brave of you. But then I would expect nothing less."

"You're too kind." She lets those words hang there. They both feel the gravity. "Don't think for an instant that I don't have moments of sheer terror. But it's time my life was mine to control." Another pause, and then she adds, "It seems we've both of us arrived at that conclusion."

 _There was a time we were of one mind._ He doesn't allow himself to voice that thought, but he can do nothing to stop the smile that crosses his lips.

"If you've no need to dash off, my lecture starts in half an hour." _If we're to make a start, you need to know what my life consists of now._ "You'd be most welcome."

For the first time since her grandson's birth, he watches her face light up completely. Unguarded, her smile radiating from within. "I'd enjoy that very much," she tells him. "As long as you're sure that I won't be in your way."

"Nonsense. It'll be good practise for your certification anyway. Besides, I would feel a bit adrift speaking on this particular topic without my right hand present."

"What do you mean?" She cocks her head inquisitively and catches him wrong-footed for the moment.

 _So very pretty,_ he cannot help but think again.

He retrieves a stack of papers from his briefcase and pushes them across the desktop towards her, watching as she reads.

 _The Provincial Cottage Hospital in Wartime  
by Maj. Richard E. Clarkson, MBChB_

She looks up at him with astonishment. "Was this published?" There was a time she'd have known the answer without asking, but when her life took its detour she got out of the practice of following the medical journals.

He nods. "It was in the _BMJ_ in February."

She glows as she tells him, "I'm pleased to see you writing again; sharing the breadth of your knowledge." She shakes her head in apparent wonderment before continuing, "My, my, Richard … it would seem the world is your oyster."

He had come to believe that the presence in his life of someone who really knew him, and with whom he could share his successes, was inconsequential. He was satisfied enough in his own accomplishments, but seldom paused to consider their significance.

Her obvious pride in him; her effervescent joy on his behalf, suddenly has him thinking that perhaps he was wrong.

He begins to wonder whether meeting her again, the fear of which for so long had plagued him, might not in truth be a case of meeting his destiny in the very road he'd taken to avoid it.


	5. I always knew you'd do the right thing

**A/N: I'm back. Terribly sorry this has been so long in coming. Who would have known that mothering an 11-, a 9-, and a 7-year-old could be such a whirlwind? I truly don't know where the last two months went. Anyhow. My apologies for having kept you waiting, and I do hope this proves worth your while.**

 **xx,**  
 **~ejb~**

* * *

It's been a week, and he hasn't seen her again. It's given him distance from the events of that day, and on the whole that's a good thing. He thinks that he's just about over the shock of it.

 _Cor,_ but he was angry when he first saw her! Perhaps he ought not to have thought himself safe from reminders of the past, given the fact that the Royal Yorkshire was the very hospital that subsumed Downton Cottage. But in nearly two years he'd never once heard the Crawley family's names spoken; never run into them; never been called upon to go back and visit his former place of employment. To his mind that had indicated that he was finally free.

He supposes he'd hoped that if he ever did see her again she'd be miserable. Hopeless. Those thoughts fuelled many a night of working too late and drinking too much. But as soon as he laid eyes on her, they'd vanished.

He'd be a terrible liar if he said he hadn't felt a trace of relief on learning that Dickie Grey was no longer in the picture. That wasn't to say he took joy in the man's demise, but he'd never been able to understand her fascination with him. Nor could he comprehend why she'd so readily dismissed the notion of even discussing marriage with _him,_ but the instant that sallow-faced bore had said "I love you," she'd melted.

Many times in the past week her words have echoed in his head. _"I went mad after I lost him, Richard."_ He understands her assertion that her life was turned back-to-front by Matthew's death. His heart had nearly broken when she asked whether he'd believed she ought to have been put away. He will admit —privately, at least— that he had, indeed, entertained the notion.

One thing makes as little sense to him now as it did then: if she was so starved for love and so much in need of a place to belong, to be useful, why didn't she turn to him? He had done everything in his power to support her, to offer sympathy without pity. To listen without judgement, to remind her that she was not as alone as she believed. Why wasn't it enough?

He would have done anything for her. She could have taken back her position as head nurse at any time and he'd have been relieved to have her. Well, some of the time he'd have been relieved, and at other times she'd have driven him to the brink. To say she'd have infuriated him, with her high ideals and patient-centric zeal, was likely closer to the truth. But oh, how he'd have welcomed it! How far preferable that would have been to the listless, aimless, empty shell she became. He would even have borne it if she'd felt the need to lash out, to hit him, to scream. To rage until at him until she broke, at which point he would gratefully have caught her up and held her fast and fitted the pieces back together.

Instead she had chosen to believe that she was unloved. That she had to rail against everything and everyone who cared for her. To take every difference of opinion as a personal affront. Worst of all, she had concluded that her only means of proving her worth was in rescuing a poorly man from his abusive son.

At some point, he reckons, he's going to have to concede that all the puzzling in the world won't bring him answers. She is no longer bound to Dickie Grey, and it appears that since his death, her uncontainable spirit has been resurrected. He has only spent a single afternoon with her, but in that time he'd seen incontrovertible proof that the woman he used to know —the closest friend he'd ever had— is still alive and well.

 **oOo**

Reminiscences of their friendship had come to him over and over again during his lecture. Whilst speaking about the state of Downton Cottage Hospital and its operations in wartime, he realised just how much he had relied on her. In fact, he called her up to the lectern and introduced her during the question and answer period. Some of the students recognised the name of Richard Grey, Lord Merton; many more were familiar with the work of Dr. Reginald Crawley. One student posed a question to them both: what was the most difficult case they treated during the war?

She had looked at him, and he at her, and it was like old times. She deferred to him and he answered, "Without question I would have to say it was that of Captain Matthew Crawley, who happened to have been Lady Merton's son."

She glanced at him, silently seeking permission to interject, and he nodded. "My son and his soldier-servant sustained injuries in a shell attack at Amiens. The were sent home to Downton, where the other young man succumbed straightaway. The blast damage to his lungs was too extensive to survive. My son's spine was believed by the field medics to have been damaged, and Dr. Clarkson's own examination confirmed their findings. As a nurse, I was disheartened, for I knew the road that was ahead of him. As a mother, I was devastated …" she trailed off. He glanced at her and their eyes met.

 _You don't have to do this,_ he told her without words.

 _I'm sorry, but I think I do. His story needs to be told._

 _Very well then. Just remember that I'm here._

She smiled so softly that only he would have recognised it. He watched her draw up taller, squaring her shoulders. She continued:

"Matthew had his entire life ahead of him, and some rather interesting prospects on the near horizon. Day after day, as he languished in bed, they began to dim, one by one."

"Every indication was that the spinal cord had been transected, and given that Captain Crawley had no feeling in his legs, it appeared that he would be rendered impotent," he supplied.

"Which was most distressing when you consider the fact that he was engaged to be married at the time, and he was also in line to become the next Earl of Grantham." She eyed him again. He could see that speaking so candidly before a group was taking a toll on her.

 _Are you alright?_

 _I will be._

He gave her a nod and a small smile of encouragement and watched her draw a deep breath.

"Matthew was my only child, and I had so looked forward to grandchildren. It stung a great deal, but gradually I let that dream go and learned to be grateful that he was alive. So many mothers, after all, couldn't say the same. He tried to set his fiancée free, but she wouldn't have it, darling girl. We were all trying to put our best face on it, and then one day a few months on she caught her foot whilst attempting to clear away a tea tray, and next thing they knew he had stood up to catch her." She paused to smile brightly at the memory, and it took his breath away for a moment. How wrong he had been to ever have thought he could be unaffected by her.

He noticed that she was looking expectantly at him. Clearing his throat (and tugging at his bow tie) he picked up the story. "Which could only have meant that my diagnosis was wrong. Now, mark you, I have never been more pleased to have been mistaken …" At that she chuckled softly, as did several of the students. "... But the family felt I had misled them. Shortly after his arrival, Captain Crawley had been examined by Sir John Coates, who believed that the injury was a severe case of spinal shock, and that recovery was possible. I didn't share his optimism, and I thought it best not to raise Captain Crawley's hopes to no purpose. The family didn't see it that way, however."

"Dr. Clarkson risked his livelihood by withholding that information, but as Matthew's mother I felt grateful that he had considered all that my son had been through, and had chosen to protect him from what very well could have been crushed hopes."

He felt certain, after hearing her utter the words, "as Matthew's mother," that she must have had to work very hard to bite back, "my opinion was the only one that ought to have mattered." She'd have been right, and he found himself wishing idly for the opportunity to speak privately with her about Captain Crawley's case now, so many years removed from the turmoil of it all.

He concluded by telling the students that the Crawley case had brought to light the disadvantages of Downton being such a small, remotely-located hospital and that, almost certainly, had he had access to the more sophisticated radiography equipment that the London hospitals enjoyed, he'd have been able to more accurately assess —and thereby treat— Captain Crawley's condition.

All in all, it had been a delightful experience: having her beside him, discussing medicine once again. It wasn't lost on him that the students had taken to her straightaway, or that there had been a fire in her eyes the likes of which he'd not seen since … well, since the conclusion of the very incident they'd just addressed, when she'd witnessed with her own eyes the sight of her son walking again.

 **oOo**

But from that day, having not seen her again (or heard from her, which has truly surprised him), it has played havoc with his thoughts. He has found himself swaying between one end of the spectrum _(You've only spent five_ _ **years**_ _getting over that woman! She's poison, and you should have run when you saw her coming!)_ and the other _(Perhaps this is a second chance, and you know how seldom those come round at this stage of the game. She was out of her mind for a time; the things she did and said weren't_ _ **her.**_ _Who she truly is. She's that woman again, the … the one you fell in love with in 1912)._

He wonders, has she thought better of coming to work —and soon, to teach— at the hospital, knowing that he's there? Surely she can't have been frightened off by the certification process; if ever he'd encountered a closet academic, it was she. To his mind that only leaves one conclusion: she has reservations about the advisability of their becoming reacquainted. He agrees, for the most part.

But there is a truth undergirding the entire predicament, and try as he might, he simply cannot deny it:

No matter the animosity between them at any given moment, they have always been able to lay it down and come together for the good of the patient. And when they do, they are natural extensions of one another, as if they share the same brain.

Or at least, they always were. It's been the better part of a decade since they've worked together now. But the way that they interacted during his lecture leads him to believe that dynamic still runs strong.

So where _is_ she?

 **oOo**

He isn't left to wonder for long. On a Wednesday afternoon he is holed up in his office marking exams. It is almost unbearably warm, and he's taken off his white coat and rolled his shirtsleeves to the elbows. The windows are open and every so often a wisp of a coolish breeze ruffles the shades, and for the first time in weeks his thoughts don't run to Isobel.

Instead he laments the brown trout he is currently _not_ catching. It would be the perfect day for a foray down to the River Aire. The air is thick and muggy; a fog is rolling in, signaling ground temperatures warmer than the air. The mayflies will be hatching in droves. _Those fish will be leaping right onto the banks today._ And he's just finished tying a new Hornberg that he's itching to test. He shakes his head, returns to his work. It's only two weeks now until the term break, and there should still be plenty of fine fishing before the spring spawn is through.

He can almost feel the bite, the wriggling fight of a big fish on his hook, when a knock sounds at his door.

"Come," he answers, expecting a student. He turns his chair around to face the doorpost and is met, instead, by the Dean of Medicine.

Scrambling abruptly to his feet, he rolls his sleeves down and reaches for his coat. "Sir, you must excuse my lackadaisical appearance. I wasn't expecting to encounter anyone this late in the day."

The Dean shook his proffered hand, then waved him off. "Never mind all that, Clarkson. You know I don't bother about such things. I've come in regards to a friend of yours."

"Oh, yes?"

"Yes; Isobel Grey, Baroness Merton. You are aware that the board have offered her a teaching position here?"

"Yes, well … that is to say, she was my Head of Nursing at Downton Cottage Hospital. But we lost touch with one another some years ago. Our paths crossed again on the day she was here to speak to the board, and she told me of the offer that was made her." He treads carefully; he mustn't speak ill of the merger between the cottage hospital and the one that now employs him, and the enmity between himself and Isobel does not —and never did— tarnish her reputation as a first-rate nurse.

"I see. I assume she will have explained that her position will require clinical service to the hospital?"

"She did say that, yes."

"That is the purpose of my visit. The board of directors have determined that surgery is the department with the greatest need for additional nursing staff, particularly a highly-qualified individual such as Lady Merton. I have relayed this information to her, and she is eager to begin at the earliest opportunity."

He has to bite the inside of his cheek in order to keep from smirking. _Eager, indeed. Some things never change._

"She would be an asset to any department, and she's a great deal of surgical experience, owing to Downton's having been designated a military hospital during the War."

"Then you've no qualms about working with her? Only she was adamant that we obtain your approval of her placement before she would start."

He nearly chokes, but manages to hide it with a raised eyebrow, clearing his throat. "Did she say why?" He silently prays that he won't have to do damage control. But Isobel wouldn't betray their past. _Would she?_

"Only that there was some dissension between the two of you at the end of your tenure. She insisted that her position on the hospital board was the cause, and that it was nothing to do with your professionalism."

 _Well, that was good of her,_ he thinks. "Nor had it anything to do with hers. No; we work well together. She'll be a welcome addition to the surgical department." _So long as her enthusiasm doesn't get in her way._

"If you're sure. I know I don't need to tell you that there is no room for infighting amongst staff in this hospital."

As a younger man he'd have bristled at those words; as it is he knows it's part and parcel of managerial due diligence.

"Certainly not, Sir. Please advise Lady Merton that she has my endorsement."

The Dean eyes him with a bit of incredulity. "Very well then, Clarkson. I shan't take up any more of your time. Good day."

"Good day, Sir." They shake hands in parting and then he is left alone to wonder what in God's name just happened.


	6. The water is wide

**A/N: Would you, lovely readers, do me a favor? Drop a line, by way of reviews or PMs, and let me know whether you'd still follow along if the rating were to jump to 'M' at a future juncture.**

 **xx,  
~ejb~**

* * *

He is alone too much with his thoughts. After his having been approached by the Dean he finds he cannot sleep at night. He tries to read the paper and his thoughts drift to _her._ How could she think that he'd object to working with her? They had always brought out the best in one another professionally, even if it had, at times, meant each one arguing his or her corner to the point of vitriol. If he were honest, those years marked the pinnacle of his success.

Does she really think them incapable of laying aside their personal differences in the name of professional partnership? Perhaps the bit that irks him most is that she may well be right to think so. The entirety of their contention back before everything changed was down to differing opinions that could be set aside with the arrival of a patient in distress or the offer of dinner or a strong drink. Now … well. Now there is so much water gone beneath the bridge that there's no telling whether they could find the other side.

 **oOo**

Sunday comes, and he'll be in theatre all day tomorrow, then on call overnight. If he can't get some rest tonight he'll be a danger to his patients. He sits in church and wonders whether she'll be doing the same, and where*. Days like this he is thankful for creeds and catechisms and the Eucharist, otherwise he'd never keep his focus. He lights a candle after, for Matthew Crawley. Sits and prays for guidance, which he hasn't done since Leeds. And then he prays for Isobel.

He waits until he thinks she must be back from church if she did go, but then it hits him: perhaps she isn't like him, repairing to his armchair with a book and a glass of whisky of a Sunday afternoon. Perhaps she has family to see; friends. Perhaps there is a gentleman who calls on her. He doubts this, but thinking it gives him a reason to be cross with her, which for the moment he finds oddly satisfying.

He reminds himself of the necessity of a good night's sleep and, after talking himself out of it no less than half a dozen times, he telephones the guesthouse. Asks to speak with her, and nearly ends the call again while he waits for her to come to the telephone.

" _Hello."_ She speaks, and all of his misgivings flee.

"Isobel. I haven't taken you away from anything important, have I?"

" _Richard! It's … I'm … No, I was just in the midst of Gray's. Veins of the Head and Neck."_ She sounds surprised to hear from him, but not unhappy.

"Ah, captivating stuff, that."

" _Well it is, but at this point I close my eyes and all I can see are spidery lines running every direction. I was glad of the break."_

He grins, and her star rises a little in his estimation. Count on her to be hard at it. _The woman is relentless._ "Have you got a date yet for your exams?"

" _Yes, it's the third of next month. As in, three weeks away."_

"I shouldn't worry. You know your stuff." _Better than I, at times._

" _Knew. I_ _ **knew**_ _my stuff, before I took a sabbatical of nearly a decade._ _ **Why**_ _I didn't go and register with the GNC** when I had the chance … I'm still kicking myself over it. Could have avoided all of this."_

"The wisdom of hindsight. I shouldn't be too hard on yourself though. You'd just been through the unthinkable."

" _That's as may be, but the technology's all different now, which makes good medical practice entirely different. I feel like a green girl."_

"Well that brings me round to the reason I called. I had a most interesting conversation with the Dean on Friday …"

He hears her groan and can picture her cheeks going pink. " _Ah, that. I can—"_

"Just—" he interrupts. "Isobel, you could have come to me. Telephoned. Something. Are we so far gone that we can't discuss these types of things? _Richard, the board want to assign me to surgery, only I wasn't sure you'd agree to work with me again._ That's all it would have taken."

There is a pause before she speaks again. _"_ _Would_ _you believe it if I said that I didn't want to come on too strongly? The day that we met again was a rough go, and when it ended well I didn't want to dredge up anything else, in the event you'd sooner just move on."_

He doesn't know what to say. "Well that's … something I'll admit I hadn't considered. And it's very good of you. I wanted you to hear it from me, though, that I would have no qualms about working together. I've thought it through. You'd be Chief of Surgical Nursing, along with all that entails: assisting in theatre, training new recruits. Keeping the nursing rota and an inventory of supplies and possibly, seeing as I know you, assisting me with marking. It moves far more quickly than things did in Downton, and at times we're all hands on deck. I need someone I know I can rely on, and I feel certain you're up to the task. I just didn't want you to be uninformed."

" _Y_ _ou're_ _being awfully good about this. I'm sorry that I didn't approach you myself; consider it a lesson learned. I'd like us to be friends again, but if I'm honest it's uncharted waters for me."_

"I don't think there's protocol for this sort of thing. We dictate the terms. And I don't want you to think that we're _not_ friends, either." And then he says something his own ears can't believe, even as the words are tumbling from his lips: "I'm willing to start over if you are."

" _I'd like that very much. More than I can say. And I'm ready for it: the pace and the frenzy. I'm anxious to get my hands dirty again."_

 _That's the Isobel I know._ He suspects that she can hear him smiling when he tells her, "I'd expect nothing less. So I'll see you whenever it is they've asked you to report …"

" _That'll be Wednesday then. In the meantime I've got to dig the old greys out of mothballs. Hopefully they won't need much in the way of alterations."_

 _You haven't changed a bit,_ he wants to assure her. Or rather, she did change for a time, and radically, but she's back to herself once again. He hopes so anyway, desperately wants to believe that the Isobel with whom he reunited two weeks ago, and to whom he speaks now, is the one who was his best friend. The one full of fire and drive and idealism who gives as good as she gets and who never met an argument she didn't want to jump in the middle of.

He manages to tell her, "You may be pleasantly surprised."

" _Fingers crossed. Richard, thank you for ringing me. It's been lovely chatting with you, rather like old times."_ When she pauses, he can see what her face is doing. That demure little half-smile, the reminiscent look in her eyes. " _If you don't mind my saying so, it's made my day."_

His heart skips a beat, he is sure of it. And he must have forgot to breathe because he's sputtering now, certain he looks as much a fool as he feels. Thank heaven above she can't see him!

" _Richard, are you alright?"_ He hears her call to him.

He manages to catch his breath. "Yes, quite. Sip of water went down the wrong way. Anyway I'm glad to talk to you as well. I'll see you Wednesday morning, then."

" _Good night, Richard."_

"Goodbye, Isobel."

 **oOo**

It had been naive of him to think that he would be able to sleep after having spoken with her. He lies awake in the wee hours, replaying every word she said. Her palpable relief at hearing him say he looked favourably on working with her again. His, when she agreed to start over with him, as friends.

He's picturing them side by side in theatre, or in clinic, doing intake. How he'll introduce her to his colleagues; how he'll field the inevitable enquiries about her coming in with clout, senior to the other nurses. He feels oddly protective of her, wants to set her up for success.

She needs none of that, he knows, and more than that, she'll be furious if her worth isn't proved by virtue of good graces and hard work. Still. He just wants this to work out for them. ( _Them?_ The realisation jars him.) For her to be accepted, respected. At least now he doesn't wonder why he feels this way.

He has given himself up to the fact that he loves her. Certainly, still, he wars over it internally. The intransigent pull of the heart versus the evidence, logic, common sense reminding him ceaselessly that she hurt him, and to what extent. It doesn't matter how many times he turns over the facts; his heart will not be moved to anything but greater affection. But at least he no longer berates himself for that which he cannot control.

 **oOo**

By Friday of their first full week of working together, he can breathe easy. Stand back, hands off, and watch his department running like a well-oiled machine. The workload is the same —perhaps greater, even— but Isobel's presence has made it seem like half as much.

She'd ruffled a few feathers at first, mostly veteran nurses put out by an interloper coming in and having jurisdiction over them. The chairman of the board of directors had briefed the team and swiftly put a stop to any outward dissent. But the greatest impact had been made by Isobel herself: she had invited each nurse in turn to sit for tea in the staff room, getting to know them and sharing a little about her own experiences and her desire to add to the surgical team, not to detract from it in any way.

As she'd weighed up the skill set of each nurse, she had begun to take the youngest under her wing, allowing them to practise skills they had as yet considered above them, whilst keeping a watchful eye. And she'd asked her own fair share of questions; advice. There were many with far more knowledge than she about equipment that was only in the dreaming stages back when she'd last practiced regularly.

He had given her the use of his surgery, access to his library in order to revise for her exams after hours, so long as he wasn't seeing students. She'd accepted his offer with great relief, and he'd begun to find her practically living there, leaving her mark upon the space in subtle but inescapable ways. She always tidied more than the bit of room she used; organised the books by subject (he'd long since abandoned any sense of order; ' _neat'_ was sufficient enough). Kept a shawl of hers hung on the back of his door for when she got cold.

 **oOo**

It's a week from the day she's to sit for her certification, and he thinks it curious, as he approaches the building in the inky dawn hours, to see a light glowing in the window of his surgery. Perhaps he'd forgot to turn it off before leaving last evening, though he's usually mindful of such things.

As he slips his key in the lock, however, it turns without resistance. He frowns. He'd never overlook locking up.

He opens the door to find Isobel slumped over his desk, asleep atop a stack of textbooks and notes written in her impeccable hand. The fingers of her right hand are curled protectively around her readers and he knows, can so vividly picture how it must've played out.

He ponders, just for a moment, slipping back out as quietly as he came in, but then thinks how stiff and sore she'll be already, and it'll only be worse the longer he leaves her. But he can put the kettle on, fix her tea. Wait whilst the water boils and then again as it steeps.

But how to go about waking her? It's not all that unusual, the scene that he's walked in upon. He's long since lost count of the number of times in his career he's been awakened by his nurses in the very same circumstances. There was many a time he'd slept at the hospital in Downton out of necessity; no telling when an injured soldier would awaken screaming in agony in the middle of the night. And other times, faced with the prospect of going home to a cold and empty house, when poring over journal articles until, like Isobel, he collapsed from exhaustion, seemed the easier road.

But there is intimacy in finding her like this: unguarded, vulnerable. None of his nurses had ever been in love with him, at least not to his knowledge. They'd simply shaken him awake: a doctor at his post; sometimes offering tea or coffee. He'd nodded his thanks and they'd all got on with it.

By contrast, there is all manner of complication in the current scenario. She is not bound to the space by any means; she has chosen to be here. He tries, somewhat unsuccessfully, to avoid attaching significance to the fact that she felt comfortable enough to fall asleep here. And he will not countenance the weight of his personal feelings for her upon his appraisal of the situation, nor her appearance; how tender and accessible she looks.

The boiling of the kettle calls him from his musings and he's glad of the task as he fusses with the tea things. He tiptoes in to look at her: long lashes fanned out against the pale pink of her cheeks and several wayward tendrils of flaxen hair curling at her nape. He does not think how he'd like to touch them, nor of the softness beneath his lips if they were to brush against that cheek.

No; his thoughts don't run so readily now to the dark downturn of his life after she allowed Dickie Grey command over her own. His memory flashes on their telephone conversation; how gobsmacked he'd been to hear his own voice uttering the words, _I'm willing to start over._ Their implications, he realises, frighten him: he may well be on his way to forgiving her.

In the end he touches her shoulder, squeezing gently. "Isobel," he says softly but assertively, "Isobel, you fell asleep, dear." _Dear? It's a good job she won't be sharp right now._

"Hmm?" she sighs breathily, groggily, rolling her shoulders, pushing gradually with her palms flat against the desktop until she is sat upright. He tries not to stare as she blinks away sleep, adjusts to the brightness of the rising sun spilling through the window where he has lifted the shade.

"Oh! Richard!" She jumps nearly out of the chair when she perceives him stood there on the other side of the desk.

He raises his hands to show he means no harm. "Steady on. You fell asleep," he repeats now she's coming round. "I didn't think it wise to leave you any longer."

"No," she agrees, "thank you. Goodness knows how I must look." _Soft,_ he wants to say. _Beautiful._

Instead he tells her, "I've fixed tea. Want some?"

She nods. "Thank you. Oh, my neck. What a thing to do."

He pours the tea. "How late were you working?"

She has to think. "Last I glanced at the clock I think it said … three?"

"You know I can't allow you to stay and work this morning then."

"Under normal circumstances I'd fight you, but I'm afraid I quite agree." She digs her fingers into the back of her neck in a bid to loosen the knots and he itches to do it for her (so much that he has to ball his own hands into fists to keep himself from reaching for her).

He manages a grin and a witty comeback. "Aye, you really are in a bad way then!"

"It's the blasted good medical practice scenarios," she confesses. They're completely different to what we learned fifty years ago, and they go against intuition. I can't get anywhere with them."

He nods. "When I started at Leeds I had a great deal of catching up to do. I'll concede you did have a bit of a fair point back in Downton; we were sorely lacking in regards to technology. I didn't realise the extent of it until I found myself in a modern hospital." He looks down at his teacup, then at her, and catches her in the midst of doing the same. They share a smile, a chuckle at the discomfiture.

"Yes, well," she says softly, "however right I might've been, I was completely wrong." She holds his eyes and there is unspoken understanding, a step made towards one another.

A weighty silence threatens until he grants her a reprieve. "I've been immersed in the application of the new guidelines for a few years now, and if it would help, I'm happy to look over the material with you. After you've had some rest, I mean."

Relief floods her features. "I'd be indebted." Then she bites her lip.

He raises an eyebrow.

"Only there's loads of them. And that's before taking into account the anatomy and physiology practise questions."

His answer comes naturally, as does the smile; he cannot curtail it. "Best we make a start then."

She brightens immediately. "You're serious."

"Would I offer if I wasn't? Look, if it helps, think of it as me being a selfish old git; I _need_ your help to run the department. And …" he begins, but then thinks better of it. He's already laid himself open to excess with her.

But she doesn't let it drop. "And _what?"_

 _Damn her eyes!_ He doesn't think she knows it, but she could ask him anything, anything at all, looking at him with those guileless, trusting eyes, and he'd be absolutely powerless to refuse her.

Guarding himself when she's around takes such an effort, whereas forthrightness still feels like the proper default, in spite of what's passed. "And I should like to see you succeed. You deserve to be happy." He clears his throat; averts his eyes, smooths his moustache between thumb and index finger. "So …"

She sputters. "You do? I _do?"_ Shakes her head. "Well … Richard … It seems I've underestimated you."

He doesn't know what to say to that, and it's back to uneasy smiles and silence until he says, "Finish your tea and I'll drive you to the guesthouse. You'll sleep; I'll come by after work and we'll go to dinner someplace. And then we'll dig into _Gray's_ and good medical practice."

* * *

* - Several fics I've read have suggested that Richard is Catholic. This fic assumes that he is, indeed, while Isobel is CoE.

** - General Nursing Council, established by the Nurses Registration Act of 1919. Nurses were admitted to the register if they had practiced for at least three years prior to 1 November 1919, but they needed to apply by 14 July 1923. We know that Isobel was not practicing as a nurse following Matthew's death, and for the purposes of the narrative I've concluded that she did not apply, and would therefore have had to sit for the national nursing examination in order to be admitted to the register. The first national examination was held in 1925.


	7. Talking about a difficult thing

**A/N: You guys blew me away with the reviews and support of the direction I want to go in with this fic. Wow ... just. Just ... WOW. _Thank you!_**

 **xx,  
~ejb~**

* * *

His day passes in a whirlwind. There are surgical consults: a young boy with a compound fracture of the radius that failed to heal properly; a soldier with fragments of shrapnel still in his shoulder from the War. His students are filing in one after another to discuss summer placements. He owes four hours to the clinic and finds himself performing an emergency appendectomy. And at the end he's got to chart it all.

He is shattered by the time he walks out the door, and he thinks he might fix coffee before getting dressed to see Isobel, but then it occurs to him: perhaps she's just as much in need of a lift as he is. He rings the guesthouse and waits for her to come to the telephone.

" _Hello, Richard?"_

"Isobel. Are you alright?"

" _Much brighter now, thank you. Don't let it get out, but I'm glad I took your advice."_ They share a laugh. " _How did the day go?"_

He sighs. "It was … long. I've only just got in the door. I'm glad of the work, to be sure, but it's caught up with me today. I rang because I was about to fix coffee, but then I thought perhaps you could use some as well. There's a cafe I'm quite fond of; we could stop off there first if you like. Then I was thinking of the Golden Ball for dinner. They've just done it up inside and I'd like to look in on the place, if you're agreeable."

" _I think a coffee is definitely in order if I'm to make it through the great reams of revisions I've got for us. Are you sure it's not too much, after the sort of day you've had?"_

Bless her. Exhausted though he is, he can think of nothing he would rather do than spend the evening with her. _If that doesn't speak volumes about how far we've come._ He cannot yet begin to hope for a future in which they might be close again, but he can enjoy the camaraderie that the coming hours may bring.

"It beats dropping off to sleep in the armchair! I'm being honest when I tell you I look forward to it. So I'll come by in half an hour, then. Is that enough time?"

" _Can you keep a secret?"_ she asks. He likes the impish tone of her voice.

"Cross my heart." _If only you knew._

" _I've been ready since half past three!"_

They're both laughing, the tension easing. He finds it a job to breathe properly as he listens to the musical quality of her laughter.

"Well then! I'll change clothes and come straight over."

" _I wasn't exaggerating about the raft of books and papers you know. It's in three boxes. Are you sure you've got room in the boot?"_

"We'll manage, alright? Now let me go so that I can get there."

They ring off and his spirits are higher just for having spoken with her. He is at once giddy at the prospect of spending purposeful time with her, and chastising himself for being so easily swayed. He changes his bow tie for a regular one and his coat for a soft cotton jumper and realises he's preening. For her. Should he shave? _Steady on; that's getting ahead of oneself._

 **oOo**

The guesthouse is as nice a place as one could hope to find in York, but it isn't _her,_ he thinks as he parks his car alongside the front. He's brought her by here a few times now and each time he's had some kind of low-level misgivings about it, but he hasn't been able to pinpoint what it is that seems _off._ Until now. He supposes he never realised it, but there is an association in his mind between _Isobel_ and _home._ Which is strange, considering that he saw her back in Downton as often at the Abbey or the hospital as at Crawley House. Perhaps it's symbolic of a larger oddity: Isobel had a solid grounding when he knew her before. Now she lives the life of a transient. Her entire existence has been in a state of upheaval for several years, and whilst she's always been highly adaptable to change, he'd be willing to bet she's growing weary of it. He files it away; he isn't sure they're on the sort of footing now that would allow him to broach the subject. But he is curious to see whether she does.

She is waiting just inside the door when he arrives, a consideration he appreciates. There is an element of discomfort in meeting her like this, subject to the disapproving scowl of the proprietress; feeling almost as if he needs permission to take his friend to dinner. There's no changing it, so he'll get by, but it doesn't feel _right._

It isn't until they arrive at the cafe that he feels free to look at her, address her. Let it sink in that he and she are out together. When it does hit home, that's exactly how it comes to him. _She. And I . Are out. Together._ _Blimey._ Should he offer her his arm when he hands her out of the car? Will it be seen as an assumption that she is weak, unable to navigate on her own, in need of a man? Will she think him rude, distant, insincere if he doesn't make the overture? He always knew precisely how to _be_ with her. Why is he floundering so now?

He opens the car door for her, and she accepts his hand without hesitation. It's a sizable step up and out. When she is stood beside him, he does offer his arm, tagging the gesture with, "If you like." But she's already reaching for him before he gets the words out, and if he had to guess by the look on her face what she's thinking, he'd put it down to something along the lines of, _You dear, strange, silly man. Isn't this what we do?_ Perhaps she doesn't perceive the effects of time and distance on the relationship between them like he does.

The cafe is quiet, which is the reason he frequents it. They are shown to a tiny booth tucked away in the back corner.

When their coffees are brought to the table, she cradles hers in her palms, closes her eyes and leans her head against the back of the booth as she takes the first sip.

"Good?" he asks, pleased by her enjoyment.

She nods. "Superb. And very much needed. I'm glad you had this idea."

He is glad as well. There is something about sitting down with her as an endless day finally draws to a close. For a fleeting moment he feels oddly at peace, yet simultaneously energised, and it's little to do with the coffee. _This is it,_ runs through his mind. _She. And I. And this._ But he mustn't allow himself to dwell on it.

He looks up and notices her watching him. She cocks a pretty eyebrow at him. _Pretty. Steady on, old man._

"You'll excuse my silence, I hope. Today was very … _constant._ I find I don't quite rally like I used to," he tells her.

"Don't apologise. You haven't changed, you know. That's what I was just thinking." She smiles fondly, and he guesses she's remembering distant evenings like this one.

"Haven't I?"

She shakes her head. "No. You've always been reflective. It's nice, really."

"It used to unnerve you!"

"Yes, and I would talk to fill the silence. I know! Many a good row was begun that way." She looks wistful about it, which is precisely how he feels.

"You've become rather circumspect yourself, it would seem," he observes. He doesn't know what to make of the look that comes over her.

"Mm," she affirms. "I've had nothing but time."

"Of course. That was insensitive of me—"

"No. No, it wasn't. Of the two of us, you are not the one with anything to be sorry for. We used to do this all the time. Being here with you makes me realise how much I've missed it, and I needn't have done. If I hadn't cut you off …"

"Forget all of that. Just talk to me. I want to know what your life is like now."

"I haven't got much of one, I'm afraid. I was Reginald's wife and Matthew's mother and Dickie's … _bloody_ _saviour_ _…"_ her face reddens, her chest heaving with heavy, angry breaths. "And now I'm nothing. I have nothing. I haven't even got a home."

"I had wondered if that was troubling you," he says quietly. He was not expecting the conversation to delve so deep, so quickly, but it's the natural next step in the progression of this tenuous connection they've begun to restore.

"I've been in stasis from the day Matthew died, only I wouldn't face it. And now I think I'm finally beginning to wake up, only to find I've lost ten years. All of the questions are still unanswered; putting them off did nothing but delay the inevitable." She scrubs her hand across her face. "Goodness. Listen to me. This is not what you came out for."

"I came out," he counters, "for an evening with my oldest friend. Time was, there was no subject we couldn't address, and I see no reason why we couldn't pick back up like that again. I've not got time, at this juncture, for trivialities; have you? It was always a great relief to me that I could be myself with you. Don't say that's changed." He didn't know it was in him to articulate his thoughts so openly with her anymore, but the freedom he feels is immediate and total.

"I'm glad you think it hasn't," she divulges. "I'm so tired of pretending." She sighs and he feels the deep place it comes from. "I'm one massive, walking regret, Richard. Do you know what that feels like?"

"I do, actually." He looks at her hand as it rests on the table, itching to lay his own on top of it. They are moving forward towards something, inching along one moment; skyrocketing the next, but it's not the time for _that._ "It's alright, you know. _We_ are alright. And you're doing fine."

The corners of her eyes are wet. "Am I? What am I _doing,_ Richard?"

 _Oh, sod it._ He lifts her hand, places his own beneath it. Lays hers back on top, their palms touching. He will ignore the tingling feeling in his fingertips, the way he can feel her ulnar pulse. _Intimate._

"You're breathing new life into the surgical department, for one. Surely you can't think that's a small thing. Do you know I could go walkabout now and count on you to keep the place running? And this after ten years away from it. Just think how it'll be when you're teaching!"

She gives him a watery smile.

"You think I'm flannelling! You come by it like it's second nature, you know. Are you sure you wouldn't like to go for the MBChB?"

Her smile widens, and with her free hand she swipes at the tears that have escaped. "Oh, you."

"I'm not having you on. You want to know where your impact is felt, and that's it. If ever a person were born to do something …"

She indulges him. "If I were a younger woman, perhaps, but not now."

"No?"

She shakes her head. "I'll be seventy this year, which I'm sure comes as a shock to a lad like you.* We both know that at best, I'd be looking at eight years in training. As it is I can practice, actually use the lifetime of learning I've amassed. Believe me, if the choice had been there when I was twenty … But no, I'm afraid that particular ship has sailed."

He looks admiringly at her. Smiles.

"What?" she asks, cocking her head inquisitively. _Seventy, bollocks,_ he thinks.

"There's still fire in your belly. You've lost nothing, you know."

"I've lost you."

 _Oh, God._ It's like all the air has been sucked out of the room. Of all the things he thought she might say. He aches physically. Viscerally.

"Isobel." What to say? Her name is all he can manage. He badly wants to hold her. He laces his fingers through hers where their hands rest on the table.

"I'm sorry," she whispers.

"We both of us need to decide what we're willing to risk," he begins carefully, "but let's get you through your exams first."

She blinks at him. Nods. Blinks again.

He meets her eyes, holds her gaze. "But you need to know this: you've not lost me."

 **oOo**

They move on to the pub and the mood follows along. It's unsteady ground, but nobody's walked out yet. He never expected them to get this far. Perhaps the hope he hasn't dared allow himself is not such a far-flung fancy after all.

"I'm afraid I've revealed far more than I ever intended tonight," she tells him as they wait for their meals.

"It's good you did, though. I couldn't work out how to get there, and we'd likely have kept dancing round it forever had it been left up to me."

"It's been on your mind then." _She is nothing if not tenacious._

She's been so forthright that he sets aside his own doubts about divulging the true nature of his feelings. So much of _the old Isobel_ has resurfaced and he cannot deny that she was his confidante for many years.

"I've thought of little else since that day." He pauses. "I don't want to hurt you."

She snorts. "I deserve it." He gives her a warning look. "Whatever it is, you've every right to say it."

"If you're sure …" He waits until she gives him a nod. "I allowed your marrying Merton to destroy me. I'm not happy you lost another husband, but I can't pretend to have had any warm feelings towards the man. I wanted to hate you for the choices you made. I tried for a very long time to do just that. I couldn't. I _can't."_

She blinks when he says he tried to hate her. Again when he tells her that he can't. She is being brave, he thinks. Ever stoic. "Alright," she says. Like it smarts, but she can take it.

"I was furious that day last month. Here you'd turned up, out of the blue, after all I'd done to forget the turn of events in Downton. I mean, Isobel, there were days after I left, I drank so much I can't remember them. I could have died choking in my own sick."

"Jesus," she whispers, her eyes wide in shock.

He ploughs forwards. It's getting easier now that he's begun. "I'm sorry for that image but you needed to know. That's how far gone I was. Some of the time I wouldn't have minded if I had died. You were never mine, but I certainly felt it as if you had been. As if I'd lost you. And it wasn't only love I'd lost, though that was a heavy weight. I'm acquainted with many people, but I can count on one hand the number of those who are friends. I hadn't ever been as close to a friend as I was to you. I haven't done since. And then you were his. You were gone from my life."

Her eyes are glistening wet with tears she's fighting to keep at bay. She reaches for his hands across the table.

He allows the contact. There he goes again, thinking that it feels like _home_ to touch her. "So when you reappeared, saying that you loved me after all the work I'd done to fashion a life again from nothing, I was seething. It never would have hurt, wouldn't have broken me down like it did, if I didn't love you. But it's still a hard thing to admit to in the present tense."

"I'm sure it is." Her thumbs run across his knuckles.

He closes his eyes against the sensation. "But that doesn't mean I don't feel it."

 **oOo**

She brightens later, when they're back at his and he gives her the tour. It's not Crawley House, not by a long shot, but it's bright and cosy and, most importantly, _his,_ free and clear. He's got electricity, a refrigerator, and full modern plumbing. No mortgage, and no spectre of the transitory hanging over his head neither. It took a great whack at his life savings to get in, but he can lay his head on the pillow at night knowing that, if nothing else, his little corner of the world is secure.

"It's lovely, Richard, truly. How you've had the time to set up house with your hours is a wonder."

"You mean, how have I managed it without a wife, more like?"

"I've hardly got the right to say _that,_ but the thought did cross my mind."

They have perfected an odd little dance, moving between brutal honesty one moment and half-polite, half-retiring equivocation the next. They'd both declared a moratorium on empty chit-chat and skirting the issues, but each one feels the frailty of their connection and is fearful that the slightest step trod over the line will sever it.

He doesn't find offence in her answer. He could, if he were feeling less charitable, but he considers the bridges they've begun to rebuild. "I had a long time to work out what suited my fancy, and it was easy enough to put money aside and tuck things away for the proverbial 'someday,' as it's only been just me."

There is just a flash of a sting that passes across her eyes at the words, _as it's only been just me._ But he watches her face blossom into a smile afterwards, beaming with pride. Pride _in him,_ in the life he's made for himself. And perhaps her approval shouldn't weigh so heavily.

But it does. More than anything.

"It's exactly what I would have figured you for," she tells him. "You'll be hard pressed to keep me away now."

A not insignificant part of him wants to say, _Do you mean it? Just never leave, will you?_ "You're welcome here anytime," he manages instead.

 **oOo**

The evening serves to establish a new custom for them, and every night thereafter, so long as one or both of them isn't working, they meet for dinner and then retire to his to sink their teeth into her revisions.

There is something about seeing her sat at his table or curled into the corner of his settee that gives him pause. _This_ is what his life has been lacking. Years spent working by her side; every triumph, every row; watching her walk away from him. Listless devastation; living his work, drowning his heartbreak in amber liquid. Five years in monastic solitude; brick by brick shaping a version of a life he's proud of. The farther he tried to run away from her, the less of _him_ remained. Every moment has been for the purpose of bringing him to this one. He can choose to fight it to futility or he can accept it, the idyllic highs and horrific, yawning lows it promises to bring.

 **oOo**

On the evening before her exams they conclude it's best to go teetotal. He doesn't press her much on the material; they go over the few things that worry her. She talks him through procedures as if explaining them to a student.

"You're going to ace this, Isobel. I've every confidence you'll get a perfect score." They are sat on opposite ends of the settee, a fire in the grate more for atmosphere than warmth.

"Trouble is I won't know anything for two more weeks. I'm not sure I'm cut out for this kind of uncertainty at my age."

"I promise you it's nothing more than management ticking boxes. Just you wait until the it's the middle of next term and you've got classes and surgeries and you're marking exams until midnight. You'll be in your element."

She looks pensive, slightly doubtful. "You're probably right. I don't know, Richard. I was so sure of it before, but now …"

"It's nerves getting the better of you," he assures her. "It'll feel different after it's over."

"Perhaps. It's only that …" She's on the verge of divulging something meaningful, but she stops herself short. "Oh, never mind."

He raises an eyebrow. "You can tell me, you know. Whatever it is."

She smiles. "I've brought you enough trouble already. You're probably right; it's only nerves."

It's his turn to look at her dubiously. "Alright. I'll let it lie so long as you swear it won't wear on you."

"It's a matter of timing," she explains. "The right words at the wrong time would do more harm than good. That's all."

The certainty in her voice and the sadness that passes across her eyes are perplexing to him, but he reads in it an invocation: _Please, don't let's go there now._ "If you're sure. I hate to end the evening, but I'd better be getting you back. You need your rest." He takes their teacups to the kitchen and fetches her coat from the peg by the door.

"How are you getting there in the morning?" he asks as he helps her on with it.

"Oh, I'll get the bus. There's a five to nine that should have me there in plenty of time."

"Or I could drive you," he offers. "Get some lunch after. What time does it finish?"

"It's open-ended, but they've advised all the candidates to expect it to take until two o'clock. I wouldn't want you giving up your Saturday."

"Don't be ridiculous; you're _my_ nurse. I've seen it through to this point, I can't very well jump ship now. Besides, I know you. You won't eat properly unless you're looked after."

"You are …" She narrows her eyes playfully at him; shakes her head. Smiles that smile that weakens his knees.

"Go on," he teases, "what am I?"

She looks directly into his eyes, his soul. " _Far_ too good to me."

He smiles, reaching for the doorknob. Turns around abruptly, changing his mind. "You speak of timing: the rightness and wrongness thereof. It seems that, where you're concerned, mine has always been wrong. I'm not altogether confident I've got it right now …"

He can't decide whether she looks more fearful or surprised. "Richard, what's … Are you alright?"

He takes her hands in his, moving his thumbs over the backs of them. "I ought to have done this years ago, only I let fear get in my way. Pride. Something. I've nothing to lose anymore. It doesn't have to change a thing, but it means what it means." He closes the distance between them. Moves one hand to her cheek and the other to her shoulder. Looks at her mouth and sees her lips trembling.

"Oh, my God," she breathes, and he feels her breath against his cheek. She moves into him, her hands at the nape of his neck.

He brushes his lips against hers, barely touching. She gasps, open-mouthed into his open mouth. Kisses him back the same way, cradling his face while his hands move to her waist. She is softer than velvet, than feather down, and inescapably sweet. She begins to take over, pressing his back against the doorpost, and he thinks that he might cry. Her hands on him, mouth on his, finally. _Finally._ After everything. Longtime tender kisses, making up for opportunities lost, healing old wounds.

The wave crescendoes; recedes, kisses softening. Holding one another, foreheads touching, heartbeat to heartbeat. Year upon year of friendship, longing; war and death and heartache and loneliness and fury are met now, each one in the other.

He kisses her one last time, soft but deep, and then pulls away, watching her face, her eyes. "Alright?" he whispers, his thumb sweeping over her cheekbone. Not sure whether he's asking her or himself.

She nods, her pupils large and dark, lips berry-red and swollen, and bites the bottom one. "Very."

"I couldn't very well do that back at the guesthouse and, well …" he shrugs. "You needed to know."

She clasps one of his hands between her own, raising it to her lips. Closes her eyes; kisses the back of his hand, each knuckle. Fixes her gaze on his. "Yes, I believe I did."

* * *

 *** young lad - Penelope Wilton is thirteen months older than David Robb. I hold to the same age difference for Isobel and Richard. Semantics.**


	8. Then shall my love prove true to me

**A/N: Short and sweet, because the chapter isn't. You are the best readers a girl could ask for. ***Rating jumps to M*****

 **xx,  
** **~ejb~**

* * *

Just as he predicted, Isobel receives the highest score of all the candidates who took the nursing exam. The hospital board are glad of it; she was already a fortuitous acquisition, and this achievement is seen as yet another feather in their collective caps.

Isobel herself is relieved to have it all behind her. The kudos from the Dean and the board are all well and good, but she can see through them. It isn't her personal success they're interested in at all. She is weary of the politics of hospital administration, of putting on the smile and accepting the half-sincere platitudes. The system has been this way for years and shows no signs of changing its stripes despite the advancing times. She accepts it, but it's that side of medicine she detests, and there's not a small degree of self-loathing in it. She was, after all, a card-carrying member of that very bureaucracy not so many years ago.

Richard knows all of this because she has confided in him. He had feared that their evenings together would come to an end after she sat the exams, but he needn't have done. In fact they've been together more than apart in the days since their last night of revisions. Indeed, she has been true to her word about his being hard pressed to keep her away from his place.

He is astonished by it, but so very, very happy. He'd put a great number of hours, much sweat and a considerable sum of money into the house until it reflected the image of his lifelong imaginings. Still it was always lacking an intangible _something_ he could never quite put a finger on.

It wants for nothing now. Even when she isn't here —she works opposite hours from him sometimes, and shops, and stays at the guesthouse— the signs of her are everywhere: bouquets of flowers he'd never had any use for on his own; the way she folds his tea towels in precise thirds. The pair of readers beside the lamp on the table next to the couch, resting atop a stack of her own books. Her lavender shortbread in the biscuit tin. Whether she is aware of her impact or not, she has made the house a home.

They are enjoying one another's company immensely, their friendship going from strength to strength. They bond over meals shared together in the pub or at his; they argue about how best to treat patients. A case could easily be made for their being the best of friends once again.

Their association doesn't end at friendship, but it's hard to define precisely _what_ they are. They kiss with regularity. It's usually a quick one-two on the cheeks by way of a greeting or farewell, but when she's feeling bold, she will step close and take his chin in her hand and kiss his lips. He gives back as good as he gets, but he's not been the one to initiate it, not since he kissed her by the doorpost on the night before her exams. It's sweet and irresistible and it's not about either of them pushing the boundaries of friendship, but they've neither of them said _the words;_ she not since the day of their reunion and he not directly at all yet. The sentiment is palpable, yet they remain precariously balanced on the knife edge. He had rightly articulated it: the both of them need to decide what they're willing to risk. And as yet neither one has dared to chance disturbing the delicate thing they've created.

She hasn't said so, but he can tell from the smile on her face as she puts a tray of scones in to bake, the way she hums under her breath whilst fixing tea, that she has missed working in a kitchen. He still doesn't want to dwell on it, but he has suspicions that it's been longer than the few months staying at the guesthouse since she's enjoyed the opportunity. So when she offers to fix dinner for him by way of a _thank you_ for helping her get through the nursing exams, he readily accepts. She never was keen on having servants back at Crawley House, and accordingly she'd often given her cook evenings off with pay (financed out of her own money, _not_ the Granthams'). As such he has sampled her cooking on many occasions and knows he's in for a treat.

The atmosphere is … _different_ between them from the moment he hangs up his white coat and she her apron and they walk out of the hospital together after morning rounds. As they go into town, first to the wine merchant's and then on to the butcher and greengrocer, there is an air of expectancy, unspoken but so intense as to seem almost tangible. He can't explain how he knows it, but as they step over his threshold together he is certain that neither of them will be the same after this day.

He is shattered, having been on call last night, so after a lunch of cheese and onion toasties she sends him off to bed (with a kiss on the cheek), telling him she'll wake him in time for dinner if he's not already up. As tired as he is, he's that much more aware of the fact that she is _here,_ downstairs, in his kitchen. That she will be here when he wakes; the tiniest microcosm of a lifelong dream. He listens to the rhythmic sounds of her working and gradually he is lulled into a deep sleep.

He awakens when the sun is giving its last golden gasp before its descent into twilight. _It even smells like home,_ is his first conscious thought. She'd told him she would fix anything he fancied, and he had requested cottage pie. A peculiar look had come over her face when he told her, and she had explained it away as nostalgia; that was the dish most often requested by both Reginald and Matthew. He thinks it was on the tip of her tongue to call him "adorable," or something in that vein, but she'd kept it back.

He plumps for a quick wash and a shave, donning fresh clothes before he ventures downstairs.

He stops when he gets to the kitchen doorpost. The pie is on the side and Isobel is bent over taking something —fresh bread, it would appear— out of the AGA. She, too, has changed clothes —well, her blouse, anyway. He wonders if she knows how he favours the plum-coloured one she has on now. She can't possibly know that he thinks she cuts a fine figure in that skirt, (particularly the way that the fabric stretches across her bum as she retrieves the bread), so it must be a personal favourite. She seems, in all truth, utterly oblivious to her own beauty and its effects on him. At any rate, he appreciates the gesture. And the view, though of course he won't say so. Perhaps, one day.

It's so easy, with her here before him, and all that her presence adds to his concept of _home,_ to think that the time may be coming when he can share with her, freely, just what she means to him. If he let his guard down, he could let it slip easily without even realising. But his conscience nags him incessantly to exercise caution. It is that internal battle, more than any twelve-hour shift or midnight callout, that exhausts him. Her reappearance in his life has his head spinning round faster than The Whip at Blackpool and he's lost his equilibrium. Something has got to give.

For the moment, however, he can watch her, unguarded and lovely, at home in _his_ home as she moves about with fluid grace, softly singing to herself. A heavenly being descended to earth.

Eventually he makes his presence known —it wouldn't do for her to catch him staring. "It smells delectable," he tells her as he enters the kitchen.

She turns to face him, smiling brightly. "Glad to hear it. Are you hungry?"

He nods. "Famished. You seem to have everything well in hand, but is there anything I can do to help?"

"You can pour the wine, if you like. I know you usually eat off a tray, but I've set the table for tonight if that's alright."

Indeed she has done, complete with a vase full of flowers. There are candles at each end of the table as well, though as yet she hasn't lit them. He wonders if, like him, she senses a change in the atmosphere but doesn't dare get ahead of it, lest the twig they are perched upon snap under the strain. It's silly, really; they are both leaders —he reluctantly so and she more enthusiastically— but neither of them seems willing, where the two of them are concerned, to make a decisive move.

He heads for middle ground. "Shall I light these?"

She gives him a nod and a look of … is that _relief?_ Perhaps she thinks that, given their past, she has no right to presume anything. He can't blame her; he's been reticent at best and bitter at the worst and if the tables were turned he doubts his own thought process would be different. Still, he doesn't want her to be afraid of him.

"If you don't think it's too much," she adds, and her eyes confirm his suspicions. There's hope there; expectancy, but preeminent above anything else, there is fear.

"I think it's nice," he tells her softly. In truth, "nice" doesn't even come close, but he doesn't want to go overboard. He does add, however, "I enjoy having you here, seeing you happy."

She casts her eyes downwards a moment, her cheeks taking on a beguiling pink hue. "I don't think I'd realised how much I've missed this sort of thing," she admits. "Domesticity. And …" She hesitates again, and how he wishes she wouldn't! _But what reason has she not to?_

"Please tell me." He hopes that he conveys to her the earnestness he feels.

"I was going to say that I always felt more at home in your cottage than ever I did at Crawley House. And also how delighted I am to find that hasn't changed."

"You're not the only one." For a moment their eyes meet, and the conversation they have without words is profound:

 _-I'm afraid, Richard._

 _-So am I, Isobel._

 _-I want you to let me get close again._

 _-I want the same thing. Give me time._

He thinks the exchange makes as much of an impact on her as him. She gasps, then covers it by saying, "Let me get dinner on the table while it's still warm."

He helps her carry in the serving dishes, pulls her chair out for her and pushes it in when she sits. She has seated them across from one another and he's going to have a task _not_ getting caught up in her eyes, the animated expressions on her face when she speaks.

"I hope I've done alright with this," she says. "It's been a while."

He takes the first bite, and then another. "I mean this as the highest form of a compliment: this tastes just like my mam's. In fact … " He lowers his voice conspiratorially, "Don't tell anyone I said this, but yours is even better."

She chuckles, clasping her hands in front of her, folding her fingers together. "What a relief! I shan't say a word. I'd like to have met your mother."

"Aye, she'd have taken a fancy to you as well. A woman before her time, my mother was. Ran my father's surgery like a general. I think it's safe to say she knew as much about medicine as Da by the time he retired. What about your mam?"

"Oh, she was much the same. And Scottish."

This surprises him. "No! How is it we've known each other all this time and you never told me?"

"Haven't I? Oh yes, she was a MacAlister. Glaswegian by way of Fair Isle, some generations back. She was a spitfire, the apple of my father's eye. And she was the glue that held me together when Reginald died. Tough as nails but with a heart of gold." She smiles fondly.

"Sounds rather like someone I know," he tells her.

"Oh, I don't know about that, but if there's any good in me, it was her doing. Hers and Daddy's, truly."

"Well, as I recall you were no slouch as a mother yourself." He questions the words as they are leaving his mouth. As well as he knows her, still he cannot predict how she'll take it.

She gives him a soft smile, sad but grateful. "That's very kind of you to say. I miss him, Richard. It hasn't got any easier. All my running only put it off."

He is surprised by her forthright turn, but he wants her to feel safe expressing her true feelings; if she'd done so in the first place, that entire Dickie Grey business likely never would have happened.

"However much it hurts, you know, you are successfully working through it now. I don't think you're meant to be unaffected by the loss of him at any point in your life. It only means that you love him."

"I suppose you have a point," she concedes. "Anyway, this is meant to be a happy occasion. What am I doing bringing it down?"

"If I can speak freely, I welcome this kind of discussion. It was fear of upsetting the balance that brought us trouble before, and where did that lead? Nowhere good. I'm still here. I can take it, so long as we agree to be honest. Even if honesty is saying, 'I want to run from this right now.'"

She is quiet, twisting her napkin in her hands. "It makes a change from what I've had," she finally concedes.

He is relieved by the barriers finally crumbling between them, but it's going to be a long and delicate process. On the heels of a big admission it's only natural that the desire to retreat will follow. He lightens the subject matter without changing course entirely.

"Tell me about Master George. He'll be back in Yorkshire for the summer break, surely?"

She looks at him with gratitude, her face breaking into a full and beautiful smile at the mention of her grandson. "Yes, he's coming home next week. I rather hoped —assuming Mary would permit it, of course— that I could bring him round the hospital; let him shadow us for a day, seeing as he's set his mind on medicine."

It's not been done before, but she looks so hopeful; how could he refuse her? "I'd have to float it to the board of course, but I see no reason why not. He'd have to stay out from underfoot, but I expect his manners and decorum are those of a little lord anyway, so it shouldn't be a problem."

"He does have a streak of the devil in him from time to time —which I _love—_ but yes, he can be the proper little gentleman when called upon."

"And do you think his mother will be agreeable?"

Her brows knit together momentarily. "Mary remains as aloof as ever. She loves George; I know she does. She's devoted no shortage of time and hardship to securing his future. But she's not close with him. Not in the way that Matthew and I were close. And Mr. Talbot, well …" she trails off.

"Alright if I have more of this? I don't want to seem brutish."

That earns him another earnest smile. "Don't be ridiculous. I fixed it for you to enjoy, and besides, your manners are finer than those of any lord I've known."

He grins. "Well, my mam did insist."

"See, you're the sort of man …" she starts to say, then claps her hand over her mouth to stop herself.

"We weren't going to do that anymore, remember? Look, I'm not saying this to hurt you, so please don't hear it that way, but given our recent past, there's hardly anything you could say that would do more harm than has already been done. So please don't censor yourself on my account."

"Well, that was direct."

"I learned from the best."

She huffs and looks like she might actually be miffed, and it tickles him. Once upon a time they were on the kind of terms where he could wind her up a little and she would play along. Thrust and parry was the name of their game. He's pleased that they seem to be heading that way again.

"Touché," she says. She waits a beat and then, "What I was going to say is that you're the kind of male influence that George needs. Henry, you see, only has daughters."

"Wait … _daughters,_ plural? Lady Mary's had another child, then?"

"Oh, yes. There's Victoria Violet. She was the baby Mary was expecting before … well … everything," she explains, and he nods. "She's four years old, and then little Cece —her given name is Cora Cecilia— is two. They're lovely children, but they're not my granddaughters. Cora knows what it is to lose a child, and she's tried her best to make me feel included. The girls call me 'Nana.' But Henry is altogether different with George to the way he is with his daughters. Very hands-off; very distant. I can't imagine you really want to hear all of this …"

"I told you to stop that," he reminds her.

"Right. Sorry. I just feel I'm talking too much. I suppose it's that there's been no one to say it to in such a long time …" Another glimpse into her life as Lady Merton, and once again his suspicions were correct. "Anyway, Cora really tries to be present for the grandchildren, so George has got two grandmothers with whom he has a warm relationship. But I worry that he wants for a solid male figure to learn from. Heaven knows Cousin Robert isn't it. Tom Branson makes an effort. He went back to Boston, but he brings young Sybil home in the summertime, when her school breaks up for the year. When he's around, he spends a lot of time with George. But that's only once a year for a couple of months."

"I see. You think the lad needs to see a man get his hands dirty, so to speak."

"Well, yes, amongst other things."

He can suddenly see in his mind's eye all sorts of scenarios: taking the boy out fishing; teaching him how to chop wood and build a fire. How to relate to a woman. Each one of these scenes assumes that he and Isobel are not only together, but living under the same roof. It's not as if George could come to York and stay with his grandmother at the guesthouse, and he can't imagine the youngster's mother and stepfather allowing their son to come and stay at his house, unless Isobel were there as well. And as far as that is concerned, there is optimism, and then there's putting the cart before the horse.

He opts to tell her, "Perhaps it's best to start with bringing Master George to the hospital for a day. If that goes well, then we can think about the next steps."

His answer seems to satisfy her, and she goes on:

"All of that to say that I don't get many opportunities to act in my capacity as grandmother, and it makes me feel Matthew's absence all the more. I always just assumed I'd be highly involved; my own gran was such a huge part of my life, and my mum and Matthew were two peas in a pod. But without Matthew here to promote it …"

"It hurts," he surmises. "I'm sorry, Isobel. It's not what I want for you."

"I had feared that talking about it would make the pain that much worse, but I feel … lighter now, having told you."

 _That's what I tried to tell you at the time,_ he wants to say. He hopes that she truly has learned she needn't do absolutely everything the hardest way possible. But what he says is, "I'll always listen to anything you want to tell me."

There is cherry pie for dessert; brandy, too, and he feels well and properly spoilt by the end of the meal. He tells her he will wash up, and she's about to protest when a huge yawn comes over her out of the blue.

"Oh! I'm so sorry! It's not the company, I promise."

He grins. "It's the hours we keep. No, I know it. Come on, you go and sit down where it's comfortable. Washing up is the least I can do after all this." She fixes him with a look and he adds, "I'm asking nicely. Don't make me insist."

She raises her hands in mock surrender. "Alright, alright, I give!"

Before she walks away, he catches her by the hand. "Dinner was lovely. Thank you for everything." He lifts her hand to his lips and presses a swift kiss to the back of it.

Words he said to her ages ago suddenly come back to him, and she must have had the same thought. She looks at him knowingly, telling him, "I hope we can do it again. Soon."

 **oOo**

After the washing up is finished, he puts the kettle on, fixes tea for them both. As he carries the tray into the sitting room, he is met by a sight that makes his heart clench. Isobel, tucked into the corner of the couch, is asleep, her elbow propped on the arm and her cheek resting in her palm.

He reaches for the rug and covers her with it, causing her to stir.

"Hmm?" she mumbles, her eyes fluttering slowly open.

"Shh," he soothes, "it's alright. You're shattered. Rest awhile."

"Darling," she slurs, "stay?"

His heart lurches. Surely she can't be aware of herself, what she's said.

He reaches out and lightly runs the tips of his fingers across her forehead, telling himself it's only to check she's not cold. Her eyes are closed again, but she sighs at his touch.

"Richard …" It rings of supplication and relief and he wants so very much to give in.

"Isobel, you don't know what you're saying, love." _Love?_ Well, doesn't that trip easily off the tongue? "We've both of us had an awful lot to drink. Rest now, and in a little while I'll drive you back to the guesthouse."

"Please." A single syllable, soft and solemn. Her eyes blink open slowly, revealing hope and fear. And _love._ It cannot be mistaken for anything else.

Still standing, he folds his arms across his chest, increasing the physical distance between them. "Do you realise what you're asking?" He has enjoyed the evening so very much, laughing and talking with her just like old times. _Don't let's spoil it now,_ he pleads silently.

She fixes her gaze on him, now thoroughly lucid. "Oh, I've known for nearly twenty years." She lets her words hang there, never breaking eye contact with him. "Come here. Hold me." Her gaze wavers for just a second, a ragged breath betraying her nerves. Whether by accident or intention, her next words come as a question:

"Kiss me?"

He closes his eyes, willing himself to be kind but stand firm. "Isobel," he warns. He sits down on the arm of the couch, turning his head towards her whilst angling the rest of his body away. It's been such a lovely evening; groundbreaking, really, and he can't believe she's throwing down the gauntlet now. If she's going to push, he'll have to push back. Atmosphere be damned.

"You say that this is what you want, that _we_ are what you want, yet you are _his_ widow. You can put it down to madness; you can call it whatever you like, but the fact remains that you _knew_ I loved you, and still you married him." He loosens his tie and unbuttons his collar; suddenly he feels as if he's suffocating. "When we are together, I see the woman I fell in love with, and it would be so easy to fall again. But you see, I let you destroy me once. I won't do that again."

"I know," she tells him brokenly. "It's the reason I steered a wide path of you after we ran into one another that day. I had hoped you'd see that I realise what I've done and that I know what it cost you. Loving you has never been about me. It's …" She pauses to look him over, and he gets the feeling that she is really _seeing_ him now, not merely trying to persuade him. "It's who you are, how you move through the world. I don't pretend I've anything to offer you, but I do know that you're the very best of men, and that I'm better for knowing you." She turns fully towards him and looks him in the eyes. "I should very much like the opportunity to prove my love, if you ever found it in you to let me try."

 _Doesn't everyone deserve a second chance?_ he thinks as he takes in the pain written across her features, the contrition, the sincerity.

He sits down next to her and gently touches her forearm. "I want to believe you," he tells her, accepting it when she slips her hand into his own. He has avoided the words for as long as he can. "I _do_ know that I love you, in spite of all that's passed. That has never changed. I know it's not enough, but it's the best I can do."

Her eyes are wet with unshed tears, and her face breaks into a beatific smile. "It's all I can ask," she whispers, "and so much more than I deserve."

He doesn't resist when she closes the distance between them. She takes both of his hands in her own and he feels the way they tremble. He watches her stare at his lips. For a moment he feels suspended in time; it is his last opportunity to back away. The love he has held in his heart for so long wars with his instinct to self-protect; his heart races.

And then her lips brush his, so gently that they barely make contact. His breath catches. She lets go a cry of relief, a gasp of his name which he _feels._

The first time he kissed her, he could scarcely get past thinking _My God, this is happening._ This time he is focused entirely in the moment as he returns her kiss, increasing the pressure. She opens to him and he runs the tip of his tongue across the inside of her lower lip. She mewls into his mouth and he cups her face in his hands, his thumbs caressing her cheeks.

"Yes," she whispers against his lips. _Yes,_ and his name, and God's. _More_ and _please_ are sprinkled throughout as well, and she clings to him, fingers twisting in his shirtfront, worrying the fabric as if she fears he'll disappear.

He pulls back a little, gentling his kiss. "Isobel," he murmurs. "There now. Steady." He says it as much for his own edification as hers. "Tell me exactly what it is you want. I need to hear you say it." He holds her hand, caresses each of her fingers, admires the intricate pattern of blue veins crisscrossing her delicate skin.

"I want this," she tells him easily. "I want you. _Us._ Loving one another as it always should have been. Learning from past mistakes and finding a way forward. _Together."_

It's music to his ears, but he hasn't been hurt just a little. She crushed his spirit, broke him down so that he'd had only ashes from which to rebuild. "I want that, too." He tucks a tendril of hair behind her ear. "Isobel, I can't withstand another heartbreak. I want to trust you more than you know, but …" He pauses, searching for the right words. "If we do this, I can't go back." _Please understand what that means._ His eyes fix on her own.

In answer she holds his gaze as she lowers her head and presses her lips over his heart. "I'll never ask you to. I'm so sorry," she whispers, laying her palm over the place where her lips have just been. "I love you so much."

He lets her kiss him again, slow and so achingly sweet. He reckons it was a good job he _hadn't_ known until recently that she could kiss like this, that she was so beautifully responsive, or else the longing may truly have killed him. And then a far more sinister notion steals over him: was she ever with Dickie Grey like this?

He knows that her marriage to Reginald Crawley was a very happy one, and somehow the knowledge that she had once been in his arms and in his bed doesn't faze him. He didn't know her then, for one, and by all accounts she and Dr. Crawley had been sweet on one another from childhood.

But to think of her in the arms of _that_ man —the one who stole her from him— makes bile rise, searing the back of his throat. He jerks away from her abruptly.

"I can't do this!" he spits, getting to his feet.

"Richard!" she cries, following after him, concern written all over her face. She reaches out to touch his arm and he recoils as if from a hot iron.

"Don't touch me!" he says through gritted teeth.

She crosses her arms over her chest and steps back from him, tears filling her eyes. "I don't understand," she says weakly. "Do you not … want me?"

He laughs bitterly.

"Richard, please talk to me! We were having a wonderful evening. I don't know what changed." She watches him, the way his chest heaves with heavy, anxious breaths. He is like a rabbit in a snare, desperate to flee.

"Well, isn't _that_ ironic!" he seethes. He studies her. She looks as though she hasn't the faintest idea what he's on about. It makes him _furious._ She turns her face away from him, her hands coming up to swipe at fugitive tears.

"I can't …" he begins, and just as quickly pauses, shaking his head, "... _be with you,_ knowing that you've …" _For Chrissakes,_ he is a doctor! Why can't he say the bloody words?! "... That you and Dickie Grey—"

She goes to him, her hands curling around his biceps, pulling him close. "Oh, Richard, no!" she cries as understanding washes over her. "No, my love. It wasn't … We _didn't."_ She beseeches him to look at her. When his eyes meet hers, she lifts her hand to brush the backs of her fingers tenderly across his cheek.

"He never was well enough, you see," she tells him quietly, "and even if he had been, I couldn't have …" It's hard for her to admit, and he encourages her with a nod to continue.

"He wasn't Reginald," she confesses, "and he wasn't you. I never …" She cups his face in her hands. _"Never."_

With great relief, they find their way back into each other's arms. He holds her waist loosely; her palms rest on his shoulders. He leans his forehead against hers.

"It's alright," she soothes him. It's too little, too late, really; things he needed from her years ago, before the great chasm opened up between them. But she's saying them now, doing them now. And somehow it _is,_ therefore, alright.

"Thank you," he whispers, at a loss for what more to say. Their fate rests squarely on his shoulders; he must either take a long leap of faith, forgiving the unforgivable, or else kiss her goodbye forever.

"Talk to me, Richard," she implores him. "What do you want?"

He draws a deep, shaky breath. "I should telephone the guesthouse," comes his reply. "Advise the proprietress you're staying the night with a friend, lest she wait up and worry."

 **oOo**

He washes up the tea things whilst she makes her telephone call, and when he no longer hears her voice in the distance he sets down the tea towel and turns to find her stood by the kitchen doorpost. Her hands are folded in front of her and she's making quite a study of them as he calls her name.

She looks up at him, apprehension in her eyes and her bottom lip caught between her teeth. There has been for him a kind of security in regarding her from behind the fortress of disgust at her actions. But if he is to love her, he has no choice but to leave judgement behind, straightaway and for all time.

He moves towards her, a smile on his lips. "It's alright," he tells her softly; his turn to soothe. As his arms enfold her, she throws her own arms round his shoulders. He begins to sway as he holds her, soothing them both, and she turns her face into the curve of his neck. "Isobel, it's alright."

It's a long time they stay there, the soft waves of her hair tickling his neck, her breath warm on his skin when she rests her head on his shoulder. As he runs his knuckles up and down the length of her spine he can feel her heart beating, the rise and fall of her chest with each breath. How long has he wondered about this, dreamt of it? It was never going to be reality; she was always unattainable.

 _But she isn't,_ his inner voice supplies. _She's here, and she's real._ _ **She's real; she can wound and she can heal. Just like you.**_ And with this epiphany the last of the bricks in his façade crumble to dust.

Backing up from her just a little, he takes her face in his hands. "You are a beautiful woman," he tells her.

He walks her back against the doorpost, leaning in as he kisses her. She opens for him, and when his tongue touches hers she makes a sound in the back of her throat goes straight to his groin. A niggling thought runs through his mind that he needs to show some restraint, but it is swiftly chased away by the knowledge that he has wanted this _forever._ As, apparently, has she.

She licks his upper lip and it brings him back to the present. Her hands roam his chest; his, which have been resting on her hips, slide to her bottom. He pulls her lower body flush against his own.

"Jesus!" she gasps against his mouth, breaking their kiss when she feels him hard against her hipbone.

 _Dammit!_ He knew he should have held himself in check.

She moves against him, rolling her hips, her hands clutching at his bum.

"Yes?" he whispers, pulling back enough to see her face.

She smiles, looking up at him through dark lashes. "Richard, I don't know how many more ways I can say it." She touches the tip of her index finger to his lips. _**"Yes.**_ And don't be fooled; I'm every bit as terrified as you are."

He kisses the digit. "Are you?"

In answer she takes his hand and presses his palm to her heart. "Feel this."

Her pulse is wild. Their eyes meet, and both are watching as his hand moves to cup her breast through her blouse.

" _Ohh,"_ she sighs, sucking in a breath, holding it. He moulds his hand to the shape of her and she presses her flesh into his palm, breathing a single word:

"Closer."

"Come to bed with me." He cannot believe he got his mouth to work, to form the words.

She slips her hand inside of his. "Lead the way."

 **oOo**

It feels like forever as they ascend, like the staircase sprouted new ones to spite him. _Real,_ he reminds himself once again as he climbs. _This is real._ _ **She**_ _is real, and she's here. And we're going to …_

Just as they reach the landing, she tugs on his hand, stopping him short of the bedroom door. He turns to face her fully, meeting with a knowing look and a beautiful smile, her eyes wide with anticipation and full of love. "Still with me?"

He has the briefest flash of her goodbye, that day that she'd brought Merton to see him at the surgery, speaking of the two of them as _we_ and _us._ A stab of pain in his chest, and then she squeezes his hand again and brings him back. _The past is gone now, over and done._ A glance into her dark eyes. _The future is love._

"Always," he answers, and reaches for the doorknob.

He closes the door behind them and they stand awkwardly beside the bed. Neither one is sure of the next move. He touches her shoulder and she turns to face him. She fingers the buttons on his shirtfront, looks down shyly and giggles.

"I feel like it's my wedding night all over again."

He grins and smooths his hands along the length of her arms. "Do you?" Catching her her hands in his he brings them to his lips and presses a kiss to the centre of each of her palms.

"Mm," she affirms, closing her eyes at the touch of his lips. "The first one, I mean." Her expression turns sad a moment; regretful.

He catches her jawbone in his hand. "Hey. It's alright. I knew what you meant. It's over with, Isobel. No more _'sorries.'"_ She smiles softly and nods, and he kisses the tip of her nose. "We're here now."

"I love you," she tells him, her eyes wet; bright; shining.

For the first time, he doesn't object, doesn't tag her proclamation with a sarcastic snort or clipped repudiation. His eyes drift shut, her words washing over him. _Love. Here. Now._ He touches the soft skin at the base of her neck. "I love you," he answers, finding freedom in the speaking of it. Cradling the back of her head in his palm, he draws her to his mouth, kisses her with all of the passion he's held inside for the better part of two decades.

She answers his fervour with her own, pressing as close as she can, as if she were trying to get inside of him.

The thought brings forth a low growl from the back of his throat and he kisses her neck, the u-shaped depression between the proximal ends of her collarbones. He fingers the topmost button of her blouse and feels her nod, her hands dropping down by her sides in surrender.

Her chest rises and falls as he works each button free. Her nipples stand out in sharp relief against the lace of her brassiere in response to the chill of the air, the heat of his gaze. He pushes the open blouse off her shoulders and fingers the strap of the thin garment separating him from her flesh.

"No corset," he marvels, pressing his lips to her bare shoulder.

She shakes her head. "Not since the War." It takes courage, he knows, to stand before him like this, her hands repeatedly balling into fists at her sides; _clench, release, clench._

"I knew it," he says, not quite knowing why. "Felt it when I held you." Catches her eyes. "It's quite another thing to see it for myself however." He watches her seeing his eyes on her body, and she gasps when he ducks his head to kiss the curve of her breast. When he trails the tip of his tongue over the lace to kiss her nipple, she yelps.

He straightens, his face gone stark white. "Too forward?"

She laughs, full and fair and musical, fingering his lapels. "No, you fool! Oh, Richard, it's _wonderful._ Only it's twenty-five years I've been without Reginald, and nothing in all that time. I'm … well … starved for it, I suppose." Her cheeks flush beetroot; clearly she's mortified.

He hugs her to himself. "You're beautiful. Perfect, like this. And it's nearly that long for me, too."

"Truly?" She meet his eyes again and presses her lips to his heart. "Shall I?"

He nods. "Please."

His tie hangs loose on his collar; she pulls it off and lets it drop to the floor beside her discarded blouse. "I've always wanted …" she breathes, and her lips touch the skin exposed at the base of his throat, sucking gently.

"Isobel," he murmurs. She must be able to feel the reverberation.

She is swift in opening his buttons, lifting each wrist to her lips as she undoes the cuffs. But she stops short of removing his vest; tucked into the waist of his trousers as it is, she'll have to unfasten them first.

Sensing her hesitation, he takes her hands in his and moves them to his flies. He knows there's no chance of her missing his desire for her as she works open the fastenings. Much as he longs to feel her touch him there, he is glad of it when she lifts his vest free instead, her warm palms flat on his abdomen, rucking up the hem.

In fact, it is his undoing: her hands on his skin. A sob breaks free from his chest, choking him. Year upon painful year of knowing _I can't have her_ and now … and now! And he'd be feeling right daft, but for her bidding him lift his arms and peeling the vest off. She rids him of his trousers and herself of her skirt and lays him down, wrapping him in her embrace.

He clears his throat and wipes his eyes. "Sorry, love. It got to me—"

"Shh." She pecks his lips. "This is what you should have had all along." She kisses him again, hands in his hair, tasting his skin. She blesses his scar, the bullet wound he earned at Mafeking, the rib he was forced to forfeit in exchange for his life. It isn't like a first time at all; it is sacred and knowing, unhurried as they lie atop the sheets, kissing and touching. She looks at him and says, "This is how I always meant to love you."

Gradually her brassiere comes off, her knickers, his shorts. She lies beneath him, arching against his mouth as he learns her topography. He knows now the answers to questions he's had for ages. Her lips are soft and yielding, and her mouth tastes of Calvados, sweetly dark and altogether fitting. She is ticklish just beneath her ribs, and the sounds that she makes when his mouth is on her breasts are going to be the death of him. And the way that she touches him! Long, languorous caresses and that unspoken air of relief: _Finally, you're mine._

For a long while they are drunk on the novelty of being skin-to-skin, shared heartbeats and the blessed relief found in the veritable consecration of one another's scars. She whispers to him, "You're so warm," and, "This is right, Richard," and more than once, "You're here!" as if their having got this far is as mysterious to her as it is to him.

He runs his fingers along the curve of her hip, over her belly and she shivers. He traces the crease where hip meets thigh and she urges him, "Touch me," with wide, trusting eyes and an innocence that confounds him, compels him.

He kneels before her, running his hands along her legs, easing them apart. Ghosting his fingertips across her lower abdomen, feeling the muscles jump, hearing her gasp. Gentle fingers opening her, silken damp, long slow caresses. Finding her rhythm, her spot, hips rocking, rutting against his hand. Slipping a finger inside of her; two, and _Shit, she's tight,_ and then she's keening:

"Oh, Richard … Richard, I can't—"

He moves over her, kisses her lips. "You _can,_ my darling. Come on."

And then she _does,_ and he nearly weeps again: she, set free, glorious and wanton and so far above him; yet _here,_ all wide-eyed amazement and trembling in his arms.

And lord knows what he whispers to her when she reaches for him and he gathers her up and crushes her to his body, rocking, soothing; her hairline damp with the strain of it and him, kissing it away. All the words he attributes to her, like _beauty_ and _precious;_ crazy, mad endearments —wonderful salacious things he'd never dare speak aloud otherwise— it all comes tumbling forth against the shell of her ear and then …

Then she is kissing him again, knelt before him, tongue in his mouth and the tips of her fingernails lightly scratching his scalp. Settling herself in his lap, legs straddling him and he could've made bank on his being the one to take _her,_ but she's above him, the heat of her just out of reach, tormenting him and herself with it. And then, finally, touching him, _Oh Jesus_ _ **Christ!,**_ teasing the tip of his erection against her folds, and him thanking God she was so happily married all those years because it's made her a siren. A temptress; enthralling dichotomy: doe-eyed innocent and heavy-lidded vixen. And she's panting; the tendons in her neck are stretched taut and he thought that he'd be touching her more if ever it came to this between them, but she grips his shoulders, her fingernails biting deliciously into his skin, and sinks the head of him inside her. A wincing gasp, silent open-mouthed cry, and she falls forward slightly.

He catches her, hands on her biceps, and speaks the first intelligible words uttered by either of them in so long that they sound loud to him:

"Easy. Just easy, Isobel. Been a long time."

She nods, her cheek against his forehead as his arms close around her, warm palms at her waist and then rubbing her back.

Eyes on his eyes, she relaxes around him and takes a little more of him, and then steadily more, until he fills her completely. "My God, I'd forgotten," she discloses, touching her forehead to his and the pads of her thumbs to his lips. Smiling brightly, she whispers, "I love you."

He holds her hips, massaging her, pressing her closer, and she wiggles a little, taking him deeper still.

"Isobel," he murmurs, incredulous. "Beauty, my beauty. Can't believe how good you feel."

For a long time they stay like that, savouring the joining.

Kissing, aching, needing.

A lifetime longing for this, thinking it had passed them by.

She begins to rock against him and they cry out in unison. Moves again and he pushes up into it, and there is their rhythm. Deep, slow, together, drawing out the moment.

He palms her bum, lifting her up and letting her sink back down on him. "S'alright?" he slurs, overcome with it: her wet heat enveloping him.

"Oh, my God!" she affirms, and does it again, surer of the movement, letting gravity draw her down.

"Oh! More of that!" he cries.

She smiles as she indulges him, leaning forwards, bracing herself with her hands on his shoulders. Her hair falls like a fragrant curtain around them. Still moving, she arches her back, and he kisses her breasts, feeling her walls begin to squeeze him.

"Come on, darling!" comes his hoarse, fevered whisper.

"Richard!" She shatters, panting, clutching at his shoulders. The strength of her orgasm triggers his own.

"I love you!" he shouts. "Isobel, I love you!"

 **oOo**

He doesn't want to move when it's over. Doesn't want it to _be_ over. They stay together, she in his lap and he inside her.

He brings his hands to her face, his thumbs caressing her cheekbones. "Isobel. Beautiful Isobel."

She kisses him in answer. He tastes the smile on her lips. "Richard," she whispers near his mouth. "My darling."

It's inevitable; they can't stay forever as they are, and she extricates herself from his arms long enough to turn the covers down and crawl beneath them.

He follows suit, lying on his side next to her as she lies on her back.

She groans as the blankets settle over them.

"You're not hurt?" he asks, alarm in his voice.

She shakes her head. "Mm-mm. Miss you." He hears the words she doesn't say: _in me._

He echoes the sound empathetically. "Well, there had to be a first time so that there can be a next time."

She grins. "Is that a promise?"

He kisses the end of her nose. "Oh, my darling. Now that I've had you, wild horses couldn't keep me away."

She's playful now, nerves abated. "Hadn't pegged you for an equestrian."

He chuckles at her, thinking how like a child she looks with the covers pulled up to her nose. "Ah, but I am, you see." He cocks an eyebrow at her. "Or, rather, _was._ It's been a day or two. No, what I am is smitten. You, young lady …" She giggles at his use of the term. "You are …" He trails off, words failing to capture all she is and all that she means to him.

She pulls him close, arms around him, nudging his legs apart to rest one of hers between them. "I'm _what,_ hmm?" she whispers.

He sinks his fingers into her hair and steals her breath when he kisses her. "Everything," he pronounces when he has her sufficiently undone.

It is impossible, they find, to stop touching one another now that they've started. The haze of afterglow carries them into sleep, limbs entangled, on a chorus of whispered _I love yous._

 **oOo**

He awakens sometime later with a start, blindly reaching over to the other side of the bed. It'll kill him to find it empty.

But it isn't. She is there, still beside him. He chances opening one eye. The covers have slipped down to reveal the top of her shoulder, and the moonlight through his window casts shadows that make the waves of her hair look like a topographical map of the moors.

She is there still. Beside him. Asleep in his bed. Because they made love. He has to repeat all of this to himself several times, because it defies belief. He dares not disturb her but finds he's got to touch her, to verify it's not all just a very vivid dream.

He skims his hand over the contour of her shoulder. Her skin is like velvet. She sighs, stirs a little. There's a chill in the room; he always stacks the fireplace before bed but tonight he'd been otherwise occupied. He gets out of bed. The clothing they had cast aside in haste blocks his path and he retrieves it now, draping it over the chair by the window.

He considers his dressing gown; it seems odd to be messing about with firewood in the altogether. That realisation gives him pause. He can't remember sleeping nude in … _ever._ Even in the oppressive heat of August, he has always worn at least his shorts to bed. He chuckles silently, wondering if she's done this before. That thought, mere hours ago, would have led him down a rabbit hole of rage, but not now. Now he simply reasons, _She was married a full third of her life._ To Reginald Crawley. And finds himself glad for her.

He drapes the gown about his shoulders when _Firewood is splintery_ flashes through his head. _Christ, man, you're making up words now!_ He isn't like this, never _giddy_ like this, and he knows the reason why.

She shifts in the bed, makes a little discontented sound in her sleep and reaches for his pillow. _She wants to be near him._ Perhaps that ought not catch him so much on the back foot, but it's so utterly opposite to everything he's known about her since the death of her son. Quickly following, however, is the knowledge of how she was, _who_ she was in the many years he knew her before that, and the echoes of her achingly genuine, _'This is what you should have had all along. This is how I always meant to love you.'_

 _Always._ That dangerous word they'd both bandied about with surprising alacrity in the preceding hours. And the notion that had come to him minutes earlier, on pondering both of their experiences with sleeping _en déshabille:_

 _I wonder if we'll always be like this._

 **We. Always.** He ought to feel more alarmed than he does. They've slept together! He knows now, things he puzzled about forever. The scent of her hair, the taste of the curve of her neck. The feel of her nipples scoring his palms and her heartbeat under his lips. He'd warned her there was no going backwards from here.

He is closer to her than ever he's been to anyone.

It is now, between them, as it should have been for ages. _But is how it should've been once, the way it's meant to be now?_

The answer lies in the most difficult decision he's ever made. He has forgiven her. He can consider no longer the pain that she caused him in his interactions with her from this point forward.

He knows her. Knows the best and worst of her. She is, in truth, the best specimen of humanity that he has ever known. He's never met another whose capacity to love can touch hers. She is headstrong, often to the benefit of many; sometimes to her own peril. She is a voice for those society has silenced; she has no tolerance for injustice. She leads with her heart despite possessing an intellect that supersedes his own, and she has a tendency to speak before considering the impact of her words. It's wonderfully refreshing, and it can sting like a punch on the nose.

His heart has set itself on her; he is powerless to do anything but obey its command.

"You're thinking dreadfully loudly, darling." She breaks through his ruminations. "Whatever are you doing?"

He can't help but smile. Her voice is husky with sleep and it does something funny to him. "I'm sorry, love, did I wake you? The fire went out and I didn't want you cold."

"It was warmer with you here," she mumbles, stretching. The covers slip down to her waist. She moves to right them.

"Don't do that," he interjects. The fire has lit the room with a flickering amber glow. "I want to see you."

She gapes at him, just for a second, until she sees the heat in his eyes. "Alright," she agrees and lies back down, still watching him. "I should ask, are _you_ alright?"

It's uncomfortable disrobing in front of her. No; not uncomfortable, exactly. _Unfamiliar._ He doesn't want it to be, just as he doesn't want her to feel inhibited baring herself to him.

He drops the robe. Her eyes are warm. He climbs back into bed beside her, remembering her question (and how good it is of her to ask). "I didn't know but I'd wake up alone," he confesses quietly.

"Oh, Richard." There is empathy in her tone and her expression shows that she feels his fear. "I wish that I could take all of it back. Go back to the fair and say what was actually in my heart." She sighs; shakes her head. "The first of so many wrong turns." She is facing him, propped up on her elbow, leaning her cheek against her hand.

"I don't want you to think that I'll never get past it. I don't think of it, didn't think of it tonight. It's not that I love you in spite of it, either. I just … love you. I'm sorry it's still there at all." His voice is soft as he finishes.

She touches his face, brushing the backs of her fingers across his cheek. _"You_ have nothing to be sorry for. I'll spend every day, as long as it takes, proving that I'm not going anywhere." She leans forwards and touches her lips to his. Her kiss is delicate but raw, and he thinks he can taste her remorse.

"I don't want that for you," he says as their lips part. "I know who you are. You're _good,_ Isobel. But even the best of us is only human. We've all taken a step wrong at one time or another."

She smiles, looking away from him and down at the bed.

"Oi," he says, getting her to look at him. "If we're going to be together, we can't allow the past to cast a pall on our … this." He gestures to himself and her, the space between them. " _Us._ I won't do it. Don't you, either. This is meant to be good, beauty."

She chuckles. _"Beauty."_

"Well, you are." He feels his ears get hot; doubtless she can see them flushing bright red.

"I like it," she tells him. "I'm inclined to look the other direction when I hear it, is all. I figure you can't possibly mean _me."_

His stomach sinks. "There's no one else." He feels utterly exposed revealing the deep parts of himself and his affection for her.

"Oh, darling," she breathes. "Come here."

He'd never have seen it coming (but then that could easily be said of so many things over these last hours) but he ends up lying cradled on her chest. She is doing what she does so well: nurturing, comforting. Calming anxious thoughts. Only this time, they're _his._ He finds it surprisingly easy to show her his vulnerabilities when she makes it so clear that they do not diminish her love for him.

Her fingertips trail along his back, her other hand smoothing through his hair. He can feel her breath hitch and her efforts to hold it at bay for him. At last she speaks and he can feel it just as much as he can hear.

"All this talk of beauty … _you_ are beautiful to me, Richard. I don't know why I was so afraid of this."

"Is that what it was then? At the fair, and then after Matthew?"

"Yes. I don't know as you'll understand this, but I thought … _All my love is used up._ Because, you see, I can never _not_ love Reg. And Matthew …" She clears her throat and he feels her swallow hard. "He grew beneath my heart. Blood of my blood. There's not a day goes by that I don't feel as if a part of me is missing." She chokes, her voice breaking. "Because it _is."_

He moves to comfort her but she holds up a hand to halt him.

"But I met you, and by the start of the War I knew that what I felt for you was love. And I could do nothing to change it. Even after Matthew … your place in my heart was still there. It grows, and I'm powerless against it. Reg is there, and my love for him is its own living being, I think." She heaves a great sob but she's smiling. Two teardrops race their way down her cheeks and then she's breathing again, continuing:

"Matthew will always be there, and I'll always feel that _missing_ feeling. It's ten years coming up and I know now: losing a child is not something one ever gets over. You adjust, little by little, as time goes by, but the ache …" she presses her fist to her breastbone, "... is always there. But it doesn't mean that one can't grieve and fall in love at the same time. Richard, I could no more stop loving you than stop the sun from rising. The heart decides, and we are just along for the ride."

His eyes are wet and he laughs. Of course she would have arrived at the same conclusion as he. They've had that connection from the start. "We've done it again," he tells her, reaching for her.

"Done what? Oh, have you got there ahead of me?" She smooths her index finger along the bridge of his nose.

He holds his thumb and forefinger slightly apart. "Whilst you were asleep," he explains.

"Talking of sleeping, we ought to be doing."

He shakes his head, lays her down. "Tomorrow's my day off," he tells her, "and I have a sneaking suspicion your supervising physician could probably be persuaded to give you off as well. I hear he has a weakness for headstrong chiefs of surgical nursing with Scottish mothers." He ducks his head, kisses her collarbone; little nips along the ridge of it, and she giggles. "And I know of something I need far more than sleep."

He presses her into the pillows, his hands either side of her head, holding himself up. His hips are pressed to hers; she rolls against him, whimpering. Her legs part and she's still slick, and he rubs his penis against her, hardening again.

"Isobel, what you do to me," he murmurs. Surrenders to it: her heat and her cries, her body soft beneath him, so open, so responsive. He grinds against her and they kiss endlessly. It's hot and slow and they're past inhibition, hands and mouths all over.

"Do you know what I keep thinking?" she pants, leaning up to see his face.

"Hmm?" he grunts, gliding his hand over her breast.

"I can't believe that we're doing this. I mean it in the best possible way. Like, incredulous. I thought that this had passed me by." She kisses him hard, dragging her teeth across his lower lip.

"I feel the same," he tells her, "so much the same."

"Will it always be like this, I wonder?"

He can't hold back the smile. "God, I love you."

He kisses her nipples, first one, then the other, alternating; high on the taste of her, the feel of them on his tongue, against the roof of his mouth. She's thrashing, cursing him and God and pleading with him not to stop. The friction of her centre against his erection is killing him and he doesn't want to finish before they start. "Isobel, wait, I—"

"Yes, darling?" Her chest heaves, her eyes huge and dark and wild.

"You've no idea …" he pauses, struggling for breath, "how much I want to be inside you."

She makes a funny mewling sound, a gasp she doesn't quite manage to contain, and he wonders if perhaps she's waited as long to hear those words as he's been waiting to say them. Then she reaches between them, taking him into her hand. Her eyes are fixed on his own. "Then be …" she inhales sharply as she slips him against her entrance, "... inside me."

"Woman!" he growls, and pushes deep, circling his hips, their gaze never breaking.

Her mouth falls open, her breathing rapid, tears forming at the outside corners of her eyes. He knows, he knows; it's all so much; they feel so much, it's beyond words and comprehension and the both of them combined. People fall in love every day, but there is nothing ordinary about this _._ He wonders whether they'll survive it, whether anyone could.

She wraps her legs around his waist; he moves, his hands beneath her bum moving her with him. She's hot and gripping him so tightly. He gets one knee under himself, thrusting hard once, twice, three times, and then she's _there,_ squeezing his hands, straining for his mouth, kissing him as she climaxes around him, and he swallows the sound of her.

He holds her to him hard as he thrusts inside her, spilling himself with a shout of her name.

She pulls him down to her and he collapses onto his forearms. She kisses him languidly, stretching against him, the both of them moaning as tiny aftershocks of pleasure still course through their bodies.

He breathes an astonished imprecation in her ear, reaching for her hands and pinning them against the mattress, above her head.

She laughs with abandon. "I believe I just did," she tells him. "Cheeky sod. Did you kiss your mother with that mouth?"

He grins, nipping at her lips playfully. "Can you honestly blame me, when you make love like _that?"_

"I don't know what to say to that, only it's a relief." Her voice drops to a faint whisper, practically inaudible, as she reveals, "I wasn't altogether sure I would remember how."

He nuzzles her nose. "Oh, beauty. You remembered." He takes her lips, trying to convey all that is in his heart.

"God, I could kiss you forever," she sighs against his mouth.

"Do you promise?"

She sighs. "I think we've got an awful lot to talk through," she answers practically even as she smooths her hands down his flanks, "and much as it pains me let you go, we can't stay this way." He slips from her and they both lament the loss. She curls herself into his side. "Before anything else, we need sleep. You may think better of me come morning." It breaks his heart to hear her say it, but he cannot blame her. "And it's far too soon to be thinking like this anyway. But yes, if it were entirely up to me, I would … anything. Everything. For as long as you'll have me."

He rolls her onto her back, needs her to look at him. His thumbs trace the contours of her cheekbones as he tells her, "Hear me, Isobel. I will _never_ think better of you. I've wanted this from the day we met. You're right to suggest we sleep before taking on Goliath, but it's as you said before: I love you. I didn't choose it, and I can't stop it, and even if I could do, I wouldn't. I loved you in Downton, and I love you now, and if I'm lucky enough to wake up beside you in the morning, I will love you then."

Holding his gaze and smiling, she lifts his hand to her lips. Kisses the back of his fingers, each knuckle. "This has been a beautiful night." Her voice quavers. "Thank you, Richard, for waiting for me, all this time." Her chest heaves with a dry sob, then two, three; half a dozen before she gets it under control. She presses a fist hard to her chest and he feels the aching lump she can't swallow: regrets and years lost and forgiveness she feels she hasn't the right to. "There aren't words for this," she chokes. "The closest I can come is 'thank you.'"

He weeps silently long after she is asleep.


	9. I could look away and you'd be gone

**A/N: Thank you to those who reached out after the last update. I wasn't sure whether I'd lost some of you. I still don't know for certain, but I do know that those who have stuck with me are amazing!**

 **xx,  
** **~ejb~**

* * *

He awakens to the sensation of butterfly wings flitting across his face. It feels strange, but not at all unpleasant, and he has no desire to fight it, so he lies half-awake, unmoving. Gradually he registers movement beside him, warmth emanating from the side of the bed that is always stark and cold.

The gossamer essence touches his lips and his eyes flutter open. He finds himself enshrouded in a web of soft silvery-gold. Blearily he reaches out his hands towards the source and encounters silken hair, and beneath it flesh; deltoid muscle, firm beneath supple skin.

"Isobel," he proclaims.

"Mm-hm," she murmurs close to his ear, "the very same."

"Come here," he rasps, which is silly; she can't get much closer. But she understands; without either one of them having to speak, she stretches long against him, reaching out to kiss him.

Butterfly wings once again. _That was_ _ **her!**_ "You didn't leave." He is astonished, his mouth hanging open a moment in shock before he remembers to close it.

She makes a sound he thinks of as _warm,_ a low hum of laughter from deep in her chest. "One generally doesn't, when one is asked to stay the night."

Her words pull him firmly from the last grasping tendrils of slumber. He tries to sit up and finds he can't; there is a weight upon him, holding him firmly to the mattress.

 _Her._

"Easy now. Hold on a tick." Her voice is soothing. She sits back on her knees and he plumps the pillow, leans his back against the head of the bed.

He blinks rapidly, bringing into focus the strange and beautiful creature before him. She is bare still, brilliantly backlit by the sunlight. She looks like he remembers her feeling under his hands last night; more delicate than he had imagined: slim shoulders, slimmer waist. Sun-dappled skin; fine architecture. Muscles, bones and tendons sharply delineated. Small breasts high and firm, their dusky peach blooms tightly pebbled. She is cold, he thinks, though the sun is high. He can feel its warmth on his face. No, no; not cold. She is _hot;_ watching his eyes on her body. He feels a stirring below his waist in response, but he could close his eyes and open them again and find her gone; himself alone.

He finds his voice. "I asked you to stay?"

She moves closer, her weight in his lap, warm palms on his shoulders. "Mm-hm."

"And you stayed?"

Gentle fingertips brush his cheek. "Yes."

"You stayed," he repeats, half to himself, incredulous. Then his brow knits in confusion. "But you don't feel like this in the dream. You don't speak to me."

"Have you dreamt of us, together?" There is what sounds like wonder in her question, and not a trace of the mockery he'd feared.

"Yes," he answers her, "for ages. And in the dream, you always leave me."

She takes his face in both her hands. "Richard," she says in a tone of voice that gets his attention. He meets her eyes. "This isn't a dream, love. And I am _n_ _ot._ Leaving. You. Alright? I'm _not."_

He wonders how she can say that with such determination when they've so much yet to decide, but then again she's never gone back on her word. Every oath he's ever known her to make, she's kept. Some of them may have torn his heart from his chest, but keep them, she has done.

"No?" he asks, tangling his fingers in her hair.

She is close, and leaning closer, her mouth hovering near his. "No." She nudges his nose with her own, brushes her lips against his.

He moans into the kiss, letting her lead. She nips at his lips and he whimpers; it's maddening, the way she kisses him. She drops her head into the curve of his neck and kisses her way up to his earlobe, nibbling, sucking gently at his skin.

"I love you," she whispers hotly in his ear. He wants to cry; it still feels so unreal. So unlikely.

"Isobel?"

"Yes." Her hands are on his face as she kisses her way back to his mouth.

"Isobel."

"Still me." She stills in his lap, running her hands over his chest.

"You were kissing me before?" He feels like a lad bumbling along, so ungainly beside her elegance.

"While you were sleeping? Yes. Did I wake you?"

"Yes."

She smiles, pleased with his answer. "Good. I lay awake watching you for the longest time. At first it was lovely, but I started to get lonely."

He winds a flaxen curl around his finger, captivated by its softness. Captivated by _her._ He cannot believe the words he says next, not even as they form on his lips. "You can kiss me awake like that every day."

She giggles; he's glad she's taken him for playful. "Can I then? Good to know."

He watches her for a moment, shakes his head a little. He's spellbound by the whole thing. That she's here at all, let alone beautifully naked and in his lap, in his bed. Not two months ago, he was still cursing her, hating her, or at least telling himself that he did.

She catches his chin between her thumb and forefinger. "What is it, hmm?"

He leans in, kissing her deeply, initiating for the first time since waking. "Caught me in a moment of wool gathering," he says.

"You're alright, aren't you? _We're_ alright?"

His heart soars at hearing her refer to the two of them as _we._ "Awful lot of hashing things out to get through. I'd sooner we didn't have to, that's all." He isn't sure where it's coming from: this sudden outpouring of raw honesty.

"I don't think it's going to break us, surely," she says. He is heartened by her words.

"That's as may be. Still, it won't all be pleasant."

She smiles softly, sadly. "It doesn't have to be miserable."

"You'll think I'm being ridiculous …" he starts to say, and then trails off.

"That's my province, remember? You're many things, Richard Clarkson, but one thing you most certainly are _not,_ is ridiculous."

He'd been going to ask her to lie with him a little while, only with all the other thoughts swirling round in his head he hadn't fallen on the right words. She was always keen at sensing what he needed, and he finds that hasn't changed when she arranges herself in front of him, lying on her side facing away. Turning over her shoulder to look at him, she bids him simply, "Come here."

He cuddles up behind her, her back against his chest. Warm, bare skin and soft, silken curves. _Aye, this will do._

"Thank you for that," he says at last, referencing her having pronounced him _not ridiculous._ She reaches back for his hand and draws his arm around her. When he brings his palm to rest on her belly, she places her own atop it, linking her fingers through his. "And for this," he adds quietly.

"Do you know I've thought of this for years?" Her voice is soft, confessional, but sure.

Something pulls tight inside him. "You've thought?" he sputters. "About _us? You and I?_ Like this?"

She nods. He feels the tremors of a giggle flutter through her belly. "Amongst other things. Oh, yes." She lets go of his hand to run the tips of her fingers up and down his forearm. "Anyway, never mind me. You were saying?"

He _was?_ Suddenly he doesn't remember, doesn't register anything but the fact that she has, at the very least, entertained thoughts of the two of them together in precisely the way they are at the moment. "Ah, I don't …" he stammers, "I can't …"

She looks at him over her shoulder again, an amused smile tugging at the corners of her mouth. "What's the matter? Scandalised, are you? Richard, love, _breathe!"_

He laughs, pulls her closer. Kisses the back of her neck and she arches against him. She pulls his hand to her breast and he moves it over the soft flesh, cupping and smoothing, tugging at her nipple. Her hips roll against his groin.

"Oh, _Jesus,"_ she babbles. "Oh, Richard!"

"Christ, Isobel!" He is panting now, the curve of her bum pressing into him and he's responding, throbbing. All the blood rushing swiftly south. "You're so …"

She giggles between moans. "Again with that, eh? Cat got your tongue?"

"More like the cat that ate the canary," he quips. "Shit, beauty, you're so _tempting_!"

"Is that a problem for you, love?" Her voice is sultry, thick with lust. He'd never have guessed that she would be such a playful lover.

"Not a _problem,_ exactly, only we are meant to be talking today."

She turns over to face him, propping her chin on her hand. "I'm vexing you, aren't I?"

"Not intentionally, I don't believe, but … yes. It's almost like we're speaking different languages."

"I suppose I have the advantage of you in a way," she considers.

"How do you reckon?"

"I don't think it's got to be all one way or another. Reg and I always managed to find a way forward, through the difficult things, without the passion ever falling by the wayside. I forget, you know?" Her hands are on him still, running lightly over his back. Her eyes hold that forthrightness that knocks him for six every time.

"Forget what, exactly?"

She grins. "Now this _will_ sound absurd. I forget that we're so new. I know, go on and laugh."

He doesn't, but it does make him smile. "It was only hours ago!" is all he says.

"Yes, but I've loved you for so long, I don't think of us as having begun last night. I mean it in the best way when I tell you that I feel for you like I felt for Reginald. Not that you're the same man, not at all. But the certainty. It's not me bullying you into declaring things you're not ready for, so please don't hear it that way—"

He kisses her lips. "I don't. Alright?"

"Good. Now I know that you've not had the same experience as me, so if you'd rather we didn't …" She meets his eyes, says things that words can't, "... until after we've talked, I understand."

"I'm …" He tries for the words, but he's not sure they exist. She just said, effectively, that she feels as _married_ to him as she was to her husband of twenty-five years. How does he begin to sort through his feelings in response to _that?_ They run the gamut, that's for certain. There's, _Well, then what the hell were you playing at with Dickie Grey?_ And, _Think of all the years we could have had._ And also, _Does that mean that if I asked you to marry me now, you'd say yes?_

She is watching him as he turns things over. "You're gobsmacked, clearly. It's alright. It doesn't have to change anything—"

"No!" he interrupts her. "No, it's … it's lovely. Wonderful. I'm just …"

"Lacking a frame of reference," she finishes for him.

"Quite. But I'm not ready to relinquish you just yet." He grins impishly.

"Alright then. Where were we?" She returns his devilish smile, stretching up to kiss him. He kisses back, and they fall into a rhythm, tongues stroking, hands feeling. He can't quite figure out what she likes best; every place he touches elicits a moan, a sigh, a deep gasp. He nearly can't bear the way she strokes him. So bloody good, almost too good. And that she's bold enough to do it for him! It's true; shy violet was never her _modus operandi,_ but it's so …

 _Intimate._

"Darling, if you don't stop I'm done for," he gasps out as their lips part. She looks up at him, unblemished and wanton. _How does she do that?_ It's magical. "Turn over?" he asks.

"You like that," she observes, dropping one more kiss on his lips before she turns her back to him.

"Mmm," he affirms. "The feel of you, the way you move."

"I love the things you say," she breathes, slithering against him as he rolls his hips. "I love your hands on me. You make me feel …" She pauses when he sucks on the skin at the base of her neck. "Ohh …"

He laughs throatily. "How do I make you feel, hmm?"

She echoes his laughter. "Beautiful. Young. You'll laugh at this one."

"Try me." He kisses that spot again. She inhales sharply. _Alright, then, she's clearly partial to that._

"Powerful," she says on a moan.

"Why on earth would I laugh at that?" His hand stills on her hip. He feels her shrug, the lifting and lowering of her shoulders, skin moving over vertebrae. The simple kinetics of her body fascinate him; he could easily be enthralled forever just watching her move.

"It sounds terribly grandiose. Like I think I'm something."

He grins. "Oh, it does _not._ As if you could ever. And you ought to feel powerful. You certainly are."

"Am I?"

"Love, I changed my entire life for you. Because of you."

She stills in the bed. "Well that was honest."

"I thought that's what we were doing. I don't mean that it's all been for worse. Look at where we are now." When she doesn't say anything he adds, "I thought that you said it needn't be one way or another."

She turns towards him again. "I did. I'm …" she starts, and then falters. "Just … Look, I'm fully aware that we wouldn't be in this bed together now had you decided I wasn't worth the risk. It's nothing to do with me and everything to do with you and I'm grateful beyond words that you've seen your way to forgiving me. It's just that —and maybe I'm being a selfish cow, but— I sometimes feel there'll never be a day goes by when I'm not reminded of how I went wrong." A beat, during which their eyes meet, and then, "I know I'm hardly in a position to dictate anything to you, but you see, it can't be this way going forward. Or we won't _go_ forward."

His shoulders sag, and she holds up a hand. _Let me finish._ He nods.

"That's not me threatening you; I've no reason to, first off, and even on the off chance you did deserve it, I love you, and I'd never. It's just stating the truth: we may have been meant for this —I believe we were— but it'll die on the vine if we start off on unequal footing."

He hadn't consciously done anything to seat himself in a place of prominence, and the suggestion, at first, knocks the breath out of his lungs. He certainly wasn't saying anything to that effect when he'd told her that she did, indeed, have power over him; enough, in fact, that he'd changed the course of his life because of her. And what nerve has she?! The marital contract —not that he'd ever say this to her (nor has he ever supported it)— still grants men what amounts to ownership of their wives, and here she is demanding equity! (But isn't that precisely what attracted him to her all those years ago?)

She's watching him as he thinks. The line of her shoulders softens along with her voice as she tells him, "Perhaps you're right, and we are too new to make love one moment and face our collective demons the next." She reaches for him, a warm hand on his shoulder, and the bubble of anger rising inside him instantly deflates. Dark, honest eyes fixed on his, she leans up to kiss him. "I love you."

"I love you too, beauty." Such relief in saying the words at long last. "And I'm meant to be feeding you. Late breakfast alright, or should we have a go at an early lunch?"

She grins in a way that makes him think she sees him as something he's never been before. "Breakfast," she tells him, with feeling. "But don't go pushing the boat out. Just toast and tea would be lovely."

"Reckon I can do a wee bit better than that." He winks at her. "Isobel? Alright?" She looks uncomfortable suddenly.

"Only I'm meant to be getting dressed and all I've got are yesterday's clothes."

"You know I don't bother about that sort of thing, if that's what's troubling you."

She smiles slightly. "No, I know that. Only I need to rinse out some things, wait for them to dry, and I doubt you'll want to see that. And I haven't got anything to put on whilst I'm waiting." A pause, and he feels the weight of it. "This is all rather sordid, isn't it?"

"You feel like a mistress, and you've always been a wife."

She nods sharply.

"Isobel, that's not what this is. You do know that, surely?"

She shrugs, and he feels it like a vise round his heart. "You were right. We won't make any headway until we've had a proper chat."

"Which you reckon you'll need to be dressed for."

That gets her to smile. "Bit hard to concentrate like this."

"Then have my dressing gown. Rinse out as many things as you need; you can hang them in front of these windows. Gets the most light in here. And I'll go and make a start on breakfast."

She gives him the once-over and laughs. "In the altogether, you will?"

The tops of his ears flush crimson. She makes to rise out of bed and groans as she gets to her feet.

His brows knit together. "Alright, love?" He rises, coming round the bed to help her.

The expression on her face is somewhere between sheepish and mortified, but she nods, almost imperceptibly. "Feeling a bit …" she meets his eyes briefly, looks down at the floor and then back at him, piteously, "saddle sore."

"Oh, darling." He takes her hand, lifts it to his lips and kisses the back of it. "Come here, you."

She smiles, slipping her arms around him, letting him draw her close.

"I love you," he tells her, half-whispering it into her hair. "You're precious to me, d'ye know that?"

She nods, kisses him, lips on the sensitive spot just where his neck and shoulder meet. The base of his spine tingles.

"Isobel," he sighs happily, holding her, flesh against warm flesh for another blissful moment before they turn to face their new reality. "Would a hot bath help?"

"I'd like that," she replies, drawing level with him. "You're sure you don't mind?"

" _Mind,"_ he tuts, "believe her! Course I don't mind. Water should be plenty hot. I haven't any oil or bubbles but there's this …" He steps away from her, into the bathroom, and returns presently with a bar of Yardley English Lavender soap.

She looks at him curiously. "I've used this for ages, but why've you got it?"

He shrugs, feeling his ears getting hot again. "Smells like you," he says quietly, feeling like a schoolboy.

She smiles fully, beautifully, making it a safe place for him to open his heart to her. "Oh, Richard. Lovely, _lovely_ man."

"Oh, go on wi' ye!" His words; his grin are a deflection, but the way that he catches her about the waist, his palm at the small of her back pressing her close, betrays his appreciation of the sentiment. He kisses her mouth, quick but sound. "Have your bath. Use anything you like. Breakfast will be waiting when you're through, aye?"

She nods again, smoothing the hair at his temple. "And we _will_ be alright, you and I. I can't promise it'll be neat and tidy, but we'll be alright."

She starts to walk away, and his eyes are drawn to the curve of her bare bottom, the swing of her hips. Then she turns round by the bathroom doorpost. Catches his eyes on her body; blushes delightfully. Looks up from beneath her lashes at him. "Richard? I love you." Apropos of nothing, just because she can.


	10. No sense in dancing round the subject

**A/N: This chapter felt like pulling teeth for some reason. I think it was a combination of flagging confidence and precious few blocks of concentrated time to work. I'm not the sort who can just jump from real life into my characters' minds. My kids are all working on 8-week intensive writing courses. It's my third-grader's first time having to do research and plan out his writing and he's been relying heavily on my help during their schooldays, which is normally when I grab the biggest chunks of writing time. It's fun, in a way; I'm getting to teach what I adore. It's also challenging because I have to slow down and step back and remember that he's nine. My second-grader, on the other hand, has been blasting through his grammar course like a renegade, forgetting left and right to show me his work before he submits it. But I do love his independent streak. My sixth-grader has done fine on her own ever since she figured out the topic of her essay. At any rate, I'm here. Been rereading a lot of my favorite DA fanfic authors, many of whom are UK-based, and their use of language has been insightful. So if I'm making Richard sound more Scottish at times, blame them. And Shetland.**

 **Just a very quick word, and I'll leave you to it. Did you know that writers don't know whether you're reading if you don't review? It's true. I feel (wonder; worry obsessively) I've lost some of you and it's had an effect on my inspiration and confidence. You guys owe me NOTHING; I'm just putting it out there. I appreciate each and every one of you more than I can say!**

 **xx,  
~ejb~  
**

* * *

"Don't go pushing the boat out," she'd told him when he offered to fix breakfast, and he hadn't argued with her. Hadn't argued, but hadn't exactly agreed neither. In spite of the delicious meal she had prepared for them last evening, or perhaps _because_ of the nature of the activities undertaken by the two of them in the night, he finds himself well beyond peckish by the time he makes it downstairs.

He needs to make a proper trip to the market, he concludes after rummaging through cupboards and the contents of the refrigerator. Typically that's a task for Fridays after work, but when they were there yesterday he was singularly focussed, not on that with which he ought to have been preoccupied (namely; procuring the necessary ingredients for dinner), but on, well … _her._

Still, there is bread left from the loaf she baked last night, and cherries that weren't needed in the pie. He's got plenty of potatoes in cold storage and he knows just what he'll do with them. And coffee. A full pot, drip-brewed, because she can't do without it any more than he.

By the time she emerges from the bath, he's got it well in hand. He doesn't hear her approach, has no idea she's there at all until he feels warm hands on his hips, soft lips pressed against his bare back trailing kisses from one shoulder blade to the other.

He moans softly at the contact, feels her smile like a caress against his skin. She slips her arms around his waist from behind and holds him. Her warmth suffuses into him, and time stands still a moment.

 _This is it._ The missing piece of the puzzle that has been his life.

He is reluctant to break the still silence, but he doesn't want to seem impolite or to foster an air of unease. "Did you enjoy your bath?" he finally asks her.

She nods against his back, resting her cheek there. "I'm feeling much better." And then, more softly, _"You_ feel wonderful."

He reacts viscerally to her words. His heart thumps hard in his chest, his stomach fluttering. His groin tightens. "Would it be very wrong of me to ask you never to let go?"

It still feels dangerous to lay his heart open to her like this, but he is through with suppressing his own needs.

She laughs beguilingly. "I don't believe so, no. Would it be wrong of me if I didn't want to let go?"

He grins. "Definitely not." Having finished the breakfast preparations, he shuts off the cooker and turns to face her.

"Do you always cook shirtless?" The corner of her mouth quirks in a tiny smile that he finds alluring. He sees the heat in her eyes as they rake over his body, clad in only his pyjama trousers.

"About as often as I bring my Chief of Nursing to my bed," he answers. He is undertaking an appraisal of his own. She looks soft as she stands before him in her bare feet; he is broader about the shoulders than she, and accordingly the v-shape formed by his dressing gown where one side of the fabric crosses over the other exposes the upper part of her chest. He wants to taste her there, where shadows fall on the concavity between one breast and the other. To feel her heart beating beneath his lips.

"Well, what is it they say about old dogs and new tricks?" She's smiling. Radiant.

 _God,_ he loves her, with her honeyed tongue, her pure heart and honest eyes, and oh! but hasn't he fallen on his feet? And for a moment he thinks, _Right, sod it,_ and almost tells her, just comes right out and says it all. _I want you, Isobel. Right here in the kitchen. Now and always. Marry me. Live with me. Lie beside me tonight, every night, forever._

After all, the moments that represent the best of them are those most nakedly truthful.

There's a case to be made, however, for letting those moments arise in their own time. What was it his mam was always on about? _A little bit at the right time rather than everything all at once._ The woman lived to ninety, after all, and one doesn't get that old without knowing _something._

He takes a tiny step back in his mind. Reaches for her and lets go a sigh of relief when she presses close. She smells of soap and tooth powder, lavender and mint. Of springtime and hope and new beginnings. Her hair, still damp, tumbles down her back in waves.

"I'll never get used to this," he confesses, swaying their bodies to a silent melody as he holds her.

"I never want to," she answers. "Want it always to feel like this."

"About this _always_ business _…"_ he begins.

She kisses him abruptly into silence. "Breakfast first though. You've put in far too much work to let it spoil." She gives him a look that says, _I told you not to bother,_ then kisses him again.

"Fair enough," he agrees. Perhaps he has gone a bit overboard. He's done egg and soldiers, griddle scones, bacon. Scotch pancakes topped with the leftover cherries. It's enough that he won't need to eat for the rest of the day, but _she_ doesn't eat, as a rule. She picks at food like a bird when they're working, so if he gets carried away in the process of seeing her properly fed, he reckons he can be forgiven.

They're quiet as they eat, companionably so, passing sections of the morning's paper back and forth between them. She washes up when they're through, quelling his protest with a look, and fixes more coffee while she's in the kitchen. He looks up when he notices it's been silent for a while and catches her leaning against the doorpost, watching him. She smiles; he raises an eyebrow.

"You're easy to look at," she says with a shrug. "And it's my prerogative now."

He thinks he keeps his jaw from dropping open, but only just barely. She hands him his coffee cup, flicking her eyes towards the couch in a wordless suggestion that they relocate. She curls herself into the corner nearest the lamp, — _her_ corner, as he has come to think of it— tucking her feet up under her, the fabric of the dressing gown shifting to reveal great expanses of bare leg.

He gives her a long look as he seats himself opposite her. _Such beauty._ "How do you suggest we do this?" he asks her. "Where shall we begin?"

"Believe it or not, I've never been in this position before, so I'll be making it up as I go."

"That's as good a place as any, then. What position is it that you reckon you're in?" He's trying not to be defensive, not to impose what he thinks she's thinking on the situation, but that remark she made about it feeling sordid, what they've done, is wearing away at him.

She sighs deeply, her smile vanishing. "The last ' _first time'_ I slept with a man I loved, I was nineteen and it was our wedding night. So there was no wondering why it happened, what it meant about us, where we were going from there. I mean I know …" she pauses to look at him, tenderness in her eyes, "I know how I feel." Then her expression hardens. "But I've less certainty about your perception of … events. Of me."

"The sooner one of us comes out and says what we're really thinking, the sooner we'll arrive at a way forward." His turn to sigh, his ire rising.

"And neither one of us wants to be the one. I suppose we should look at that as a good thing; neither of us wants to hurt the other. I doubt we'd care so much if we didn't love each other." She goes quiet, and he says nothing, and then she adds, "You do know that I love you, Richard. I hope?"

He nods, after a moment. Her visage relaxes. "The day we ran into each other at the hospital, it made me furious to hear you say it, but as time went by and you didn't push for anything in return, I started to believe you." He's quiet for a moment, studying his hands. "I'm sorry that I doubted your motives."

"I'm sorry I gave you reason to doubt. I suppose that's the crux of it: can we ever put it behind us? My dismissal of you; my waging war on the way you ran the hospital. Taking up with Dickie, involving him in hospital affairs." She pauses as if the next words she plans to speak are a weight she cannot bear. "Marrying him."

"Can you give me an inkling of _why_ you did those things? Your assertion that grief can make a person behave strangely … it's not that I feel you're trying to rationalise it, not exactly. But it does leave one wondering about your thought processes at the time."

She blinks hard, closes her eyes. Looks like she'd be eternally grateful if the floor were to open up beneath her and swallow her whole. "It's not that the question is unfair," she begins, "but it hasn't got an easy, linear answer. The truth is —and I know you hate it— that I took decisions, in grief, that I'd never have taken under normal circumstances. As it relates to the hospital, I should have accepted your suggestion that I come back as head nurse. I am a doer; I'm not an administrator, and it wasn't a wise move, accepting the position of almoner. Serving as chairman of the board whilst I was practicing was one thing; deciding matters from on high, when they had no bearing on my daily life, was another. I failed to consider how you would take it: my insistence that the hospital would be better managed by outsiders than by its chief physician of more than thirty years."

"Fair enough," he says, "but that's not the whole of it."

She frowns and wraps her arms around her middle defensively, protectively. He is vexed by the fact that she sees a need to adopt such posture in his presence. More to the point, he is suddenly and quite thoroughly irritated, full stop.

"What do you mean?" she asks.

"Can you tell me, truthfully, that there were no personal factors influencing your decisions?"

" _Personal;_ meaning, between you and me?"

He nods.

"As in, did I have a vendetta against you?"

"Only you would know the nature of your feelings towards me at that time," he says with a shrug. All of the warmth of those first few moments after her emergence from the bath has vanished. If her affect is cold, his answer is suggestive of ice in his veins. How can he love her so much and be provoked so readily to acrimony?

 _This_ is why he was better off without her.

Her next words do nothing to discredit this assertion.

"It all comes down to the fact that you knew me too well. I used it against you; I paraded it in your face; I struck out at you because you would never have let me hide behind grief and cease living life."

"And you could have said and done anything your heart desired and Dickie Grey would have fallen for it, because he worshipped the very ground you trod upon!" he spits. "I just …" His chest aches as if she had reached in and torn out the very heart within it. He rises from his seat and begins pacing. "I can't …"

She turns to watch him. "Richard, make me understand. _Please!_ Last night you said you'd never think better of me, that there was no turning back if we came together. I know that I've hurt you, but just exactly what have I done that is so unforgivable? I. _Never._ Slept. With. Him!"

"Suppose he hadn't died, eh? You could well have been married to him for thirty years, you realise. A _stranger,_ Isobel. A stranger fixated on a self-invented image of you with which he fell in love. You're saying you'd sooner live a lie; that you'd have used him, taken advantage of his blind allegiance rather than chance falling apart in the arms of the man who truly loves you." He makes for the door, seething. As angry with himself as he is with her. _Damned fool idiot!_

She scrambles to her feet. "Yes. _No!_ No, that's not what I meant. Richard, don't walk away! Please hear me out." He turns away from the door, plants his hands on his hips. Shoots her a look that asks, _Satisfied?_ She nods, and continues:

"It was easier to push you away. You see, without me, you've made a life for yourself. A— And … and you've been safe. How could I let you get closer, knowing what would happen? Everyone I love dies!" Tears run down her cheeks and she turns away from him, swiping at them with obvious frustration.

He freezes. His knees threaten to buckle. _Oh, shit._ This had never occurred to him. As well as he claims to know her, how could he possibly have missed it? It doesn't erase the hurt or repair the damage done, but—

"Christ, Isobel, you think it's your fault, don't you? Your husband, your son … you think they're dead _because_ you loved them!"

"I don't kn—" she begins to say, turning back towards him, "I don't …"

She can't speak, and, ignoring the voice inside his head that tells him to stay clear, he goes to her. Puts his hands on her shoulders. "Darling, in no way are you responsible for their deaths." He tilts her chin up until her eyes meet his own. "You _have_ to know that."

Her brow creases. "It makes as much sense as any other explanation I've come up with. You see, there's _got_ to be an explanation, Richard, because otherwise they died in vain, the …" she gulps back a sob, "the loves of my life."

 _This isn't about Dickie Grey at all,_ he realises. Neither is it a case of too much power having gone to her head. If he understands her properly, she was pushing him away from the fair onwards in a bid to protect him from herself because she believed she was some sort of harbinger of death.

If he still had any reason to doubt, it is swept away when she says:

"Dickie's death only served to further my suspicions. Perhaps I needn't love a man at all in order for him to be damned; perhaps all it took was proximity. I know it sounds mad, and I won't fault you if you don't believe me, but I've had many solitary years of these thoughts haunting me—"

"You can't see the forest for the trees," he finishes for her. Nonplussed, he shakes his head. He'd finally got his long sought-after explanation, but it bears no resemblance to any of his myriad imaginings. The only thing he knows for certain is that she is not the cold, calculating termagant he'd figured her for.

His hand reaches for hers; their fingertips touch and she gasps. Looks at him with an expression he can't quite read.

"Come," he tells her, steering them back to the couch. He sits down and she hesitates. He nods encouragingly and she seats herself towards the centre.

"Isobel, it's alright." He opens his arms to her. She eyes him haltingly for a moment, then comes to him, resting her head on his shoulder but otherwise holding herself rigid.

"Och! Come on, lass! I don't bite." He lowers his voice to a whisper, leaning close to her ear. "Not anymore."

It has the desired effect of getting her to laugh, and also (he notes with satisfaction) of causing gooseflesh to rise over the delicate skin at the junction of her neck and shoulder. His arms come around her waist and she relaxes into him. He tries to calm his heart rate when she lays her head on his bare chest. His efforts are in vain. _Breathe in, breathe out. Sweet Jesus, she's warm. And soft. And underneath that dressing gown, she's—_

Her words cut through his thoughts, mercifully, before he gets ahead of himself.

"Does this mean that I'm forgiven?" She turns her face to look at him without lifting her head.

"Oh Isobel," he tuts. "I forgave you in here (he taps his head) the day we met again. Surely I've said …"

"No." She shakes her head, "no, you haven't done. Which brings me to another sticking point. If I may …" Now she sits up, backing away from him enough to permit conversation.

He nods. "'Course. I reckon you'd better."

She smiles, then abruptly looks pained. Smiles again, a little sadly. "How to say this delicately …" she mutters, pausing to think. She folds her hands in her lap and studies them intently, and all the while he watches.

"Richard," she says at last, "I'm going to preface this by saying that you're the best of men, and far be it from me to suggest you change anything about yourself."

"Bloody hell," he grumbles, "this is gonnae smart then."

She graces him with a soft smile, squeezes his hand. "No, love. It's only that it isn't the simplest task, figuring out what you're thinking. You're not exactly the most forthcoming chap. I'd say it's to do with the fact that you're a man, but you see, that's just it."

He scowls. "No, I don't see. What's _what?"_

She chuckles, and that expression comes over her face again. The one that he thinks means something along the lines of, _He's adorable._ He considers rolling his eyes, but then the tips of her fingers touch his forehead, smoothing the furrow of his brow. He leans into the contact in spite of himself and catches her hand in his. Bringing it to his lips, he kisses the centre of her palm, and before she can contain it a tiny moan escapes.

"You're distracting me." She feigns a pout, and in response he grabs her by the shoulders and kisses it away.

He likes the ease of this, feels relief in it; now that the hardest part is behind them, they're back to good-natured ribbing and gentle flirtation even as they continue to tread on shaky ground. He reckons she knew what she was talking about after all when she said that they'd be alright.

She kisses him back and it becomes deep and slow and searching, conversation falling away for the moment. Overcome by the nearness of her, he pushes her back to lie flat and moves over her, kissing her forehead and eyelids and that irresistible soft place just where her neck curves into her shoulder. Her hands are in his hair as his mouth travels the path between her breasts. He pushes the fabric aside with his nose and nuzzles his way closer and closer to her nipple. And just as she sucks in a breath, her entire body drawn taut in anticipation …

He stops.

She opens her eyes and fixes them murderously on his own. "You mean old bugger! What are you trying to do to me, Richard?"

His eyes smile in answer and they both start to laugh. He helps her up and she pulls him to her. His head is on her chest now, and he concludes that this will do. She needs to be needed and he reckons he can handle making himself vulnerable once in a while, particularly if it means her holding him like this.

"I'm sorry, my darling. You were saying?" He chuckles as the words come out.

She runs her knuckles up and down the length of his spine and he tries not to think about the fact that her hands are on his bare skin. "Ah, yes. Before I lost my train of thought —can't imagine how that could've happened, can you?" She presses her lips briefly to his temple and he feels the smile that graces them. "Anyway, I was going to say that in spite of the fact that I could never return the sentiment, at least Dickie said the words."

He sits up. "Ah. There's the rub. Thought it would go down easier if I were in your arms, eh?" He tenses, moving away from her.

Undaunted, she kneels on the floor between his knees. Ducks her head under his clasped hands, propped as they are with his elbows resting on his thighs. "Hey, no," she half-whispers, warm puffs of breath on his chest. "No. I know that it ought to have been enough: your … your actions, your manner. The way that you treated me. I suppose that I was seeking direction, looking for a clear-cut path to follow. I never had to wonder what he thought, and when I was floundering, something about that appealed, if only briefly."

It's hard to hear, but the fact of the matter is that she's here now. _With him._ He'd do well to remind himself of that, and to keep reminding himself again and again.

His throat feels raw when he speaks next. "And if I'd said them? What would it have changed?" This is an altogether different kind of vulnerability to that of a few moments ago. This kind generates a rib-splitting ache below his sternum. She holds his heart in the palm of her hand, and forgive her though he does, it remains to be seen whether she can be trusted.

"Darling, there's no way to know what might have been." She catches his chin in her palm, makes him look her in the eyes. "But you're saying them now. And that makes all the difference."

She opens her arms and he comes willingly into them, accepting the comfort she offers. For the moment it's enough; after all, how long had he dreamt of this, never allowing himself to consider the likelihood of it ever becoming reality? He believes her now, believes that she loves him and that she has done for years. They've still so far to go, but never in a million years did he imagine they'd be here.

 **oOo**

He must have dozed a bit because his next awareness is of soft humming and of fingers carding through his hair. There's a knot in his neck the size of a cricket ball, but his head is leant against something — _her_ head, he thinks— and her touch is so soothing that he's loath to move.

She must have registered the change in his breathing, because he feels her lips press against his cheek. "Well hello, sleepyhead. Good of you to join us," she says softly.

He moves a little, enough to look at her, and leans his head against the back of the couch. _"Somebody_ kept me awake half the night." He pretends annoyance. "She was rather insistent, too."

Smirking, she jabs him in the side with her elbow. "Oh, like you weren't!" Her cheeks flush beetroot and he knows she must be thinking the same thing he is.

"Oh yes. We certainly did." He affirms their shared thought and grabs her hand, kissing it. Wraps their fingers together.

"How did you?—" she starts to say, then interrupts herself. She smiles, a look of reminiscence crossing her features. "Oh, yes. I forgot how often we used to do that."

He's still groggy from his impromptu nap and he digs his fingers into the aching muscles at the back of his neck.

"Your neck didn't like the way you nodded off." No chastisement; simply an observation. Not that she wouldn't tell him off if she reckoned he needed it, mind. This knowledge makes him appreciate her gentle remark all the more. "Lean forward," he hears her direct him. "Chin to your chest if you can."

He does as he's told and in short order her hands alight on his shoulders. Her fingertips smooth across the area, assessing his condition. "Just here, yeah?" She locates the source of his discomfort.

"Aye," he grunts as she begins to knead.

"Sorry, darling. Going to hurt a little more for a minute but then it should start to improve. The muscle is in spasm; you ought to let me give you something for it."

"No. It'll put me flat on my back for the rest of the day." He doesn't mean to be gruff.

She doesn't flinch. "I'm not going to push. Breathe, Richard."

Oh, right. He'd forgotten momentarily. He draws a deep breath as she applies pressure with the pad of her thumb to the centre of the knot in a twisting motion.

Suddenly his muscles relax, the pain vanishing. She continues to touch him, the warmth of her palms ensuring he doesn't cramp up again. He groans with the relief of it.

"Better?" she asks, leaning forward to press a kiss to the back of his neck. She doesn't let go, her arms coming around his shoulders to enfold him.

"Much. You're an angel."

She chuffs a laugh, warm breath against his skin. "Remember that the next time I get your blood up." He echoes her laughter. She kisses his cheek. "I should have a hot bath," she suggests. "I'll bring you up a cup of tea."

He raises an eyebrow. "Will you heck. How positively scandalous, Lady Merton!"

She has the good grace to laugh, but then she wrinkles her nose. "How rotten is it that I can't stand being called by his name?"

He smirks; he simply cannot help it. "Depends on whom you're asking," he says with a shrug.

"Well, what does the good Dr. Clarkson have to say on the subject?" _Oh!_ The look on her face! It's one part smug; one part amused, and entirely provocative.

"I believe the exact words are … 'Thank you, Jesus.'"


	11. True love is a hard found thing

She is as good as her word. He isn't in the bath ten minutes when the door opens to reveal her carrying a cup of tea. She smiles shyly as she hands it to him, as their fingertips touch.

He is groggy, lulled by the warm water, and he gives her a nod and a sort of half-grunt in thanks as he wraps his hands around the teacup.

She giggles. "It's back to bed for you, young man." Her eyes are alight with joy and perhaps just a touch of mischief.

"I've got to go to the market today," he protests. "Get some food in."

"I'll go," she tells him. "You should rest; your eyelids are already at half mast."

"I can't let you do that! What sort of host would I be?"

She is clearly amused. "But you're not my host! You're my …" Suddenly she goes serious, and her eyes display all of the same uncertainty that's been playing havoc in his mind. "Anyway," she continues, trying to preserve a bit of dignity, "anyway. I will go; just give me your list. And you should rest."

He closes his eyes, leaning his head against the back of the tub. "If you insist, but we'll go together." He waits for her to challenge him, but no provocation is forthcoming. "Say, Isobel," he calls to her as she's turning to leave. She looks back at him over her shoulder. "Stay, would you please?"

Her eyes grow large at his request. He can see the thought as it passes across them. _This is …_ _ **intimate.**_ He watches as she crosses back to him, kneeling down beside the tub.

"Alright?" he asks. His eyes remain trained on hers.

"Mm," she affirms. "I was just thinking … you really are letting me _all the way in._ It's quite remarkable."

"How's that?"

"Your heart is a very precious commodity. That's not me speaking about the whole of humankind; I'm talking about you, your heart in particular. Don't think for a moment that all you've done is lost on me." She studies the rim of the tub momentarily. "Your trust is something I don't deserve at all, and yet …" Her eyes glisten at the outer corners. She reaches into the bath, beneath the water, for his hand, weaving her fingers through his and bringing them to rest over his heart.

Will there ever come a time when he is not dumbfounded by the fact that she's touching him? He thinks not. _Hopes_ not.

"You guard your heart very closely," she continues. "In all the years we've known each other, there's never been a woman, has there?"

"No."

"And why is that, Richard?"

"What are you on about, love? Hmm?"

"What is this, Richard? _Us?_ What does it mean to you?"

He rolls his eyes, panicking on the inside. "Isobel, I—"

"I presume I'm the first woman —at least, in a very long time— to sit with you in the bath. I'm right, aren't I?"

"Aye."

"This isn't casual, in your mind. Is it?"

"No, it's not. I'm … Look, Isobel …" He is flustered. This has got to happen, but that doesn't make it any less awkward.

"I'm not going to hurt you, darling. Not on purpose; not anymore. If I do, you'll tell me, and I'll put it right. Alright?"

He nods.

She moves back behind his line of sight, and he wonders why until he hears a splash, then feels the wet warmth of the flannel on his scalp. His ears register the sound of the shampoo bottle being opened, and then he feels her hands in his hair. Nobody's done this for him since his mam when he was a wee lad. "Perhaps this is better. You talk; I'll listen. You don't have to look at me."

Does she ever know him! He nods, relaxes as she rubs the lather into his hair, and begins. "There was an … attraction straightaway when we met. I'd be blind not to have noticed. But I knew that you'd lost your husband and it was clear that you were still very much his wife, so it was nothing I'd have brought to your attention. No offence, but I'd always thought that the notion of love at first sight was a construct of women." He pauses here, knowingly, and she says nothing but huffs audibly. "Working together, it wasn't long before I'd seen you from all sides. I learned you could be headstrong, and stubborn, and meddlesome. Even so, I still felt for you. Worried about you. I liked who I was better when you were around. It's not like I'd had much experience with which to compare it, but I was sure it was love before you'd been a year in Downton." He falls silent, melting under her touch, and obliges when she asks him to lean back so that she can rinse the shampoo.

"But you couldn't have known then that we … that _this …"_ She falters. He's not the only one having difficulty getting his head round the new developments between them. "You could have been happy, Richard. All this time. You could have found someone to share your life with—"

"Bah!" He dismisses the notion with a sort of growl. "What would've been the point?"

He can feel her hesitate. Her hands alight on his shoulders. "What do you mean?" Her next words come as a whisper. "You deserve happiness, Richard."

He reaches for her hand, tugs on it. She scoots forward so that she can see his face.

"It doesn't matter, Isobel, because I've found it now." He reaches up to her as she leans down. She lets him kiss her, going in for another when he ends the first. Then he continues:

"Nothing else would have come close. I'd have wasted my own time as well as some other poor soul's. Besides, I _did_ have you. Perhaps not in the ways I'd hoped. But I _was_ happy; getting to work alongside you, visiting you at Crawley House. I wouldn't change it for anything."

"No?" She sounds genuinely surprised.

"Well of course I'd love to have been … like this, then. But it's not that our friendship was second best. I dunno, Isobel. I'm making an awful hash of this—"

"No, you're not! It's lovely. For what it's worth, I knew that I loved you by the start of the War. As you well said, I was still so much Reginald's wife up to that point. Very much in denial." She huffs again, this time barely audible. He wouldn't have caught it but for his longtime familiarity with the rhythm of her breathing. She dips the flannel into the water again, runs the flannel over his shoulders and down his back. "The time I wasted," she tuts. "Reg didn't want me to mourn for him so long." She chuckles mirthlessly. "He didn't want it at all. But after what we had, how could I not have done? Do you know … I knew, aged ten, that I would marry him. It was only a matter of time. I loved him before I knew what it was."

He is surprised by how much she's revealing, but he doesn't say anything, just keeps listening. Her touch is slowly dissolving him. It is bliss, unadulterated.

"At first, when I realised I was in love with you, I was afraid that it would be a betrayal of Reg and of our marriage. Later, after I reconciled the fact that I could love you _and_ always love him, I still felt that wouldn't be fair to you." She pauses, and he can hear her thinking. "You'll be glad to know that I've learnt I was wrong."

"Indeed," he affirms, grinning at her. She leans in and kisses him, and he deepens it before she can pull away. _Sweet, sweet, sweet._ When they do break apart, whilst they're still face-to-face, he tells her, "You know I've half a mind to pull you in here with me."

She laughs. He'll never _not_ be fascinated by the sound of it. "You think you know a person …" she starts to say with a peculiar smile and a tiny shake of her head.

"Go on," he prompts her.

She follows the contours of his collarbones with the flannel. He's never been looked at with the fire he sees in her eyes. He _burns_ for her.

"You're a very … _ardent_ lover. Not that I'm complaining, mind you. Much to the contrary." She trails off, looking away as she thinks. _"Lovers,"_ she practically whispers. "That's what we are now, Richard. I don't mean to suggest for a moment that it isn't good enough, but …" A very long pause, her uncertainty palpable. _After all I've done, will he accept the way I feel?_ Her voice quivers as she tells him, "You're so much more than that to me."

"This is a longer conversation, isn't it?" He hears the question neither one of them dares voice.

 _Where do you see this going?_

"Yes, I'm afraid it is."

There is no doubt in his mind: the time that he'd long since stopped believing would ever come, is strangely, impossibly, suddenly upon him.

He could not feel less prepared.

 **oOo**

Mid-afternoon, sat on the bench in his back garden, they pick up where they left off.

"Sunday tomorrow. Good day for a lie-in," he says, trying to be casual. His knuckles lightly graze hers where their hands rest side-by-side.

"Is it? Not going to church then?"

He shrugs. "I suppose it depends."

"Depends upon what?"

He looks at her pointedly. "Are you staying tonight?"

She raises her eyebrows. "Is that an invitation?"

He could use some work on his approach, he reckons, his shoulders sagging a bit. "In my head, I'd already told you that I want you to feel free to come and go as you please."

"Alright." She smiles and squeezes his hand. "It's sounding better already. Go on."

"Isobel, I can't tell you what to do. I can only say that if I had my way, you'd never leave. Your being here feels like … Never mind, you'll laugh."

"I will not!" She looks a little hurt.

"I didn't mean it as a slight. Only that I'm embarrassing myself. I seem to be a soppy old sod when it comes to my thoughts of you."

"I think they're lovely. When you can be arsed to share them, that is."

His mouth drops open. Nothing she says should take him by surprise anymore, but she's so much less formal with him now than ever she's been in past. More comfortable. At least, he hopes that's the case. He forgets she comes from Manchester, that her upbringing and his own were not much different. That all of her airs and graces were part of an act, a façade. With the veneer of the aristocracy stripped away, she's so human. So wonderfully _real._ He'd seen so many glimpses over the years of the face behind the mask. Now, with no inheritance to fight for, the mask has long since crumbled into dust.

"Well, that's me put in my place, innit?" comes his rejoinder, and he nudges her with his elbow.

She gives him the side-eye and giggles.

"Well, somebody's got to do!" She's still smiling, but her eyes turn more serious. "You know, you're the most remarkable man, Richard, but you're a hell of a hard read. If I'd known …" she starts to say, and then shakes her head. "Oh, never mind. What was it you thought I'd laugh at you for?"

He studies her a moment before answering. "If you promise not to …" he says with a dubious look.

The expression with which she answers him could only be described as murderous.

He holds up his hands in surrender. "If I didn't get a rise out of you now and then, how would you know I cared?"*

She rolls her eyes.

"Alright, alright. I'll be good now." In truth he doesn't know what's got into him. She brings out a side of him that he'd long forgot about, a playful, impish streak he's never employed with a woman before. "I was going to say: now you're here it's rather like, _'God's in His heaven; all's right with the world.'"**_

"That's beautiful, Richard. Who on earth would laugh at you for that?" she murmurs, linking her fingers through his own. She raises their joined hands and holds the back of his against her cheek. "Tell me what you want."

"You said I was more than a lover to you. I think by now you've an inkling that you're far more than a lover to me as well. I want you here with me, Isobel, but I don't ever want to make you feel like a bit on the side."

That smile again, almost bashful. Captivating, her chocolate-coloured eyes blinking at him from underneath her lashes. _Lord._

"Thank you," she whispers, lifting his hand to her lips. His skin tingles where her mouth touches him.

"Are— have— … Have you given any thought to where you'll live, now that the exam is behind you?" He stammers, his heart fluttering. This is it, thisisit, _thisisit!_

"You mean you don't relish the thought of Mrs. Gubbins*** spreading gossip up and down the high street?" She says it as a joke, but he can read the brittle edge behind the front. "I'm paid up through the end of the month. I was going to give her next month's rent the beginning of the week. Why do you ask?"

"Because I want us to have the freedom to be together without worry. I know that, if I asked, you'd tell me you don't care what anyone thinks or says, but we both know deep down that isn't true. I want you to walk with your head held high, proud of yourself and your life." He rises from his seat and kneels on the ground at her feet, drawing a shaky breath. _Oh, God, oh, God!_ _It's now or never._ "I know that I owe you a real proposal this time, but Isobel … marry me. Wake up next to me every morning. Let me lay you down every night. I love you, all that you are and all you've been. Let's not waste another day."

"Oh, my God," she whispers, her hands grasping at his shoulders. _"Oh, my God!"_ Her trembling fingers twist the fabric of his shirt. Their eyes meet and hold.

"Isobel?" he prompts her, sniffing back tears.

" _Yes!"_ she whispers, getting to her knees, meeting him where he is. "Yes, Richard, yes! My God, yes!" She throws her arms around him, crushing him against her body. He holds on tight; she's shaking, laughing and crying and so is he. All of the years, the regrets and missteps and the raw, gaping wounds have led them here. The moment is so sacred he expects the heavens to rend themselves before their eyes.

When the tears stop falling and the trembling breaths cease, she lifts his chin, stroking his cheek with her thumb, and kisses him. Softly, slowly, a kiss he will call up perfectly from memory in the years to come. He feels the words she wants him to hear. _I love you, my darling._ _No matter how wrong I've been, I love you._

When the kiss breaks, he backs up far enough to see her face and smooths her hair. She swipes at her tears with a watery smile.

"Look at you," she breathes, tracing her thumbs over his lips, his cheekbones. "Beautiful." It feels to him like a title of honour. "Perhaps we ought to get up off the ground. I won't speak for you, but my knees aren't what they once were." That's Isobel; ever the practical one.

He gets up first, then offers her a hand, and when she is on her feet he gathers her up, lifting her off the ground and spinning them round. She throws her head back, laughing, and his mouth latches onto the satin skin of her neck. The light is ethereal on her face, her hair, and if she were twenty years old she could not be more stunning than she is here and now.

"I love you," he whispers, lips at her temple, feeling her smile.

She laughs; she sobs. She clutches at him. "I love you," she chokes, broken and beautiful.

 **oOo**

He had wondered briefly how it was even possible to move forward following such a moment. It feels like time ought to have stood still for them, but the birds are still singing and the afternoon shadows are lengthening. All around them life carries on.

She, on the other hand, has taken it in stride. "I'll need some things," she tells him as she stands before the bedroom mirror, pinning her hair into place, "if I'm to stay over again. And we must get to the market before it shuts." He catches her eye in the reflection and she turns towards him. "Sorry," she says with a special, private smile. "Have I killed your notion of romance?"

"No, not quite," he answers, "but it does feel strange, moving on like nothing's changed."

She crosses to him, straightening his bow tie (he manages to keep himself from kissing her. _Just)._ "I think you'll soon find that's the beauty of love. We can't stop the world turning, but we can build our own secret hideaway in the midst. Do you know that Reggie and I delivered babies when we should have been on honeymoon? It didn't stop us, mind, from enjoying our evenings like it was only we two in all the world." She throws a smile at him over her shoulder as she makes her way down the stairs, continuing to talk to him. "You've really never had anything like this before, have you?"

"Don't make fun of me." He nearly pouts.

As he reaches the bottom step, she turns and takes both his hands in her own. "I never would! Only it seems so unlikely. You're quite the catch."

He flushes to the roots of his hair. "It isn't as if I was a monk!"

She raises an eyebrow. "Oh no, quite! You … Well …" She stops herself, a hand flying up to cover her mouth.

"No, no, madam. You started this; now finish." He holds her waist loosely. Their banter is a balm to his soul.

"Well, not that I'm an expert by any stretch, but you certainly know your way around—"

"Right," he interrupts her. "That's it." Taking advantage of his hold on her, he tickles her at the base of her rib cage. She shrieks with laughter and makes a show of trying to twist out of his grasp. She quickly abandons the effort and attacks his mouth instead. "Mmm …" he gets out between kisses, "It's a good job … you're so … bloody irresistible." Giving in, he moulds his body to hers and kisses her until they're both breathless. He stands back to watch her, lips swollen and chest heaving, looking utterly debauched. He grins in satisfaction at having got her that way.

"Oh! Look at him!" She pretends offence. "So smug. Reckon you're something, do you?" Her face cracks, her shoulders shaking with poorly-restrained laughter. "That's because you are," she whispers hotly, pressing close once again.

"Conversations for another time, young lady," he tells her, stealing one last, thorough kiss. "Promise I'll tell you all there is to tell. Though it isn't much."

"How lucky for me then," she says, and means it.

 **oOo**

They take his car into town; it'll be easier that way to get the food home. He lets her off at the top of the high street, saying he's got to duck in someplace quickly and he'll meet her in the market. As he pulls up alongside the rectory he hopes she won't be cross with him later. His intention is not to rush her or to insist that they marry with the church's blessing. He just wants her to feel they have options.

He talks with the vicar, whom he knows in passing. Asks about whether they can circumvent the banns and is advised they'll need a special licence. Can it really be come by so easily, he enquires, and is met with the assurance that their working hours alone should secure them one, no trouble. He walks away with a spring in his step.

In the market he spies her chatting to a woman he recognises as the proprietress of the florist's, her case in one hand; a market basket in the other. His stomach sinks. _What was he thinking?_ Of course she'd have her case along; she'd just come from gathering her things at the guesthouse. He rushes to relieve her of the burden, then realises he's just blown any cover they might have had, and done so spectacularly. He never was good at lying. He breaks into a cold sweat and can't focus on what she's saying to him. Thankfully she's already gathered most of the items on his list and in fairly short order they're walking back to the car.

"Just a moment," she says as he's about to throw the motor into gear. "You're white as a sheet. We're not going anywhere until you talk to me."

His hands drop from the steering wheel into his lap. "I may have got a little ahead of myself this afternoon," he admits.

"Alright." She sounds apprehensive. "Go on."

"In my exuberance to speak with the vicar …" He only gets that far before she opens her mouth, and he's sure that what she means to say is something along the lines of, _'You did_ _ **what?'**_ He holds up a hand to silence her (at which she looks none too pleased) and goes on:

"Firstly, I was inconsiderate in leaving you to carry your case. But what's more, I let you walk out of the guesthouse and carry it through the market … and then I took it from you and stashed it in the boot in full view of heaven-knows-whom."

"I'm still waiting to hear what unforgivable sin you've committed." She appears perplexed and more than a little irritated.

"Isobel, don't you see? Perhaps your friend from the flower shop won't stick her nose in where it doesn't belong, but even if she doesn't say anything, everyone will know you're having it away with the surgeon you work for!"

"Oh, Richard." Her expression moves swiftly to one of pity. "I'm not 'having it away' with anyone! You're going to be my husband and I've no desire to hide it. What are you worried about?"

"Your reputation, Isobel. You worked so hard for what you've got now. You're worth a great deal to the hospital, but all it would take is for the right person to get the wrong end of the stick; you being the new girl in town and all, and a widow no less. You're a target, love. I hate to say it, but it's the truth."

As his anxiety ratchets higher and higher still, hers evaporates before his eyes. "Darling," she breathes, grasping his hand and pulling it to her lips. She smiles softly against his knuckles as she kisses them. "Dear, darling man. Take me home so that we can talk privately, yes?"

He doesn't understand, but he loves the implications. His cottage, _her home._ "Yes, alright." She wraps their fingers together and he doesn't fight it.

Only after they are inside, the food put away and her case delivered to the bedroom, does she turn to him, taking his hand and directing him to the couch. She sits down only once he has done, waiting to speak until he has taken her outstretched hands in his own.

"Richard, it speaks volumes about your love for me that you're so serious about defending my honour. However much I may want you to be wrong about the chances of our liaison jeopardising my position at the hospital, you're right. The thing is … I chose wrongly once already. I'll never do that again. I enjoy my work, but I don't need it. Whereas you …" She makes certain he is looking her in the eyes before she continues. "I can't go on without you. There's no question. And whilst I'd rather the board learn of it firsthand from us, if they find out by other means then let them. I _want_ them to know. I love you … before anything else."

* * *

*My dad has always said this to me. "If I didn't tease you once in a while, you wouldn't think I liked you!"

**From Pippa Passes, by Robert Browning. A favorite quote of my mother's.

***I'm borrowing the name of a dour proprietress from Bill Bryson's account of his first visit to the UK, Notes from a Small Island. A favorite book of mine for a very long time, it is responsible for sparking my Anglophilia.


	12. Among you at the calling of your hearts

**A/N: I made myself cry so many times writing this. I walked away from this fic and from writing altogether for a while and picked it back up because I was reading some other things, in an entirely different fandom, that gave me all the feels all over again. I have been at war with myself over whether to share because it is incredibly hard on me: the aftermath of posting an update. Ultimately, this fic is one of my proudest achievements. For now I've chosen to see it through: all chapters written, proofed, and posted. That could change at the slightest provocation, but whilst I'm feeling brave, here goes.**

 **The wedding ceremony is taken from the Book of Common Prayer. There was a 1928 revision, and we're set in 1930 here, and I took a bit from prior editions and a bit of the '28 edition because words mean things and I liked certain bits of verbiage better at key points in the narrative. Plus I thought it fit Richard and Isobel and that they would do just as I did and choose the words that were most significant for them. I have them taking a bit of license with the ceremony as well and I've no idea whether the Church of England would have permitted what they end up doing, and frankly, I don't care. I felt I owed them a ceremony befitting of them. And then there are the moments during their recollections where dialogue is quoted; those are taken, of course, straight from the script of Downton Abbey.  
**

 **I'll come back around to this with one more update; after all, we can't have a wedding without the wedding night. Thank you for your patience; I know I've left this hanging for an awfully long time.**

 **xx,  
~ejb~**

* * *

It's cool inside the church. Not quite damp, but almost, a pleasant surprise on a day that had dawned bright and cloudless and has grown stifling in short order. The suit he has worn at her behest and he's glad of it; it's the lightest weight of any he owns. His shoes pinch a bit, owing to their newness, and he can feel it as he shifts from one foot to the other. It is only by sheer force of will that he hasn't undone the stiff collar that threatens to suffocate him.

He rolls his eyes at his own ridiculousness. _Nerves. At your age. What on earth is there to be nervous about? It's_ _ **her.**_

That's precisely it, though: it's _her._ He pats his breast pocket for the twentieth time, though he can't imagine a scenario in which the rings that were there as recently as two minutes ago could have disappeared. Indeed, they remain. _Deep breath._

This is the singular experience of life he'd have gone to his grave regretting having missed. It is happening. Here. Now. He is here and so is she. Every obstacle has been overcome. The impossible is moments from coming to fruition.

Why, then are his hands shaking?

Before panic has a chance to overtake him, two small, slender hands take hold of his own.

"Richard," she whispers, and the pounding of his heart calms. Her eyes reach for his, and when he meets her gaze the world falls away. Every fear that has racked his mind and ensnared his heart dissipates as she mouths the words, _I love you._

The vicar begins to speak, standing before them, and as he listens, his mind wanders back over the details that have led them to this point.

 _We have come together  
_ _to witness the marriage of Richard and Isobel._

 _Marriage._ And him. And _her._ He can't help wondering when he's going to wake up and discover it's just another dream. All that the years have wrought: war and carnage; new life and life lost; the highest heights of their association and the deepest, desolate years of loneliness.

 _Marriage is a gift of God in creation  
_ _through which husband and wife may know the grace of God._

 _It is given  
_ _that as man and woman grow together in love and trust,  
_ _they shall be united with one another in heart, body and mind,  
_ _as Christ is united with his bride, the Church._

 _As man and woman grow together in love and trust._ Her eyes never leave his throughout the homily. _Love._ Never has their relationship wanted for it. Even in the dark times; indeed, even when the darkness seemed a direct result of it, the love has always been. _And trust._ Given with caution on her part at first, and reluctance on his, it had grown to the point that one knew the other's mind without it being spoken. And then the breach. Words he didn't say and the ones she did. Their foundation torn asunder; yet for both, the love remained.

Their reunion. Her remorse. His decision, based upon her character and not her actions, to work alongside her once again. The liberating thing that forgiveness has shown itself to be. His gift to her, certainly, but all the more to himself. Forgetting what's behind them; remembering only that she loved him all the while.

 _The gift of marriage brings husband and wife together  
_ _in the delight and tenderness of sexual union  
and joyful commitment to the end of their lives._

Her cheeks flush. They share a knowing smile, and he squeezes her hands. This is not the venue for thoughts of _that_ nature, yet he cannot stop himself. He reads the answer in her misty eyes as they blink at him, framed by dark lashes that fan out against her cheeks.

 _Soon._

He had said that to her once. It was during the fortnight they spent in Downton whilst the family had gone up to Duneagle. It was the closest they had ever been, and his heart in those days was carried along on swells of hope. Suppers at Crawley House: just the two of them and time away from the demands of work and family to talk in ways they'd never done before.

The smile that lit up her face, the blush of her cheeks as she confided, _"It's a relief to be able to talk without having to explain oneself, isn't it?"_

The funny skip of his heartbeat; the sensation of an albatross being lifted off his shoulders. _"A relief, and a privilege. And I hope we can do it again. Soon."_

* * *

The order of service keeps his thoughts from straying to dark places. The sheer horror of Matthew's death; watching Isobel's heart break irreparably. The way that he was never sure if his attempts to support her in the aftermath were welcomed, let alone successful. He knows the answer now, and that is all that matters.

 _Richard and Isobel are now to enter this way of life.  
They will each give their consent to the other  
and make solemn vows …_

Cue the butterflies, whose wings beat a cacophony inside his belly. He's meant to be taking her to dinner later, but at this rate he can't fathom eating a single bite. _Steady on, old man._ He inhales deeply and it stutters throughout his chest like a sort of dry sob.

She raises an eyebrow at him. _Alright?_ She mouths.

Just as he nods, the vicar prompts him:

 _Richard, will you take Isobel to be your wife?  
Will you love her, comfort her, honour and protect her,  
and, forsaking all others,  
be faithful to her as long as you both shall live?_

He feels the tears sting his eyes as he locks his gaze on hers and answers, "I will."

 _Isobel, will you take Richard to be your husband?  
Will you love him, comfort him, honour and protect him,  
and, forsaking all others,  
be faithful to him as long as you both shall live?_

She smiles beautifully, full and sparkling, even as two teardrops race down her cheeks. "I will," she says, with the same conviction as that time she told him:

" _I have the adrenalin here in my hand."_

He grins in spite of himself. _Just you try and stop her. She is a force of nature._

The vicar turns to address the witnesses, and she squeezes his hand with force. Her chest heaves with silent sobs.

 _Will you, the family of Richard and Isobel,  
support and uphold them in their marriage  
now and in the years to come?_

Mary Talbot, flanked by her son George, squeezes the lad's shoulder. They glance at one another as they answer in unison, "We will."

He watches her watching them, wishing he could hold her, knowing that inside her there is a tide of emotion swelling. If he could read her mind now it would tell him a conflicted tale. She can deride the aristocracy all she wants, but her grandson's status as Viscount Downton is the very thing that convinced the vicar to make an exception permitting the boy to stand, along with his mother, as a witness to their vows despite his being underage. He's certain that she is grateful in this instance, but that she would move heaven and earth for the chance to have Matthew by her side today.

For this and so many other reasons, he aches for the chance to get her alone.

He prays in earnest during the Collect. Shuts his eyes and pleads for a long life with her, now that love has finally come their way _… And please, show her favour, Father. Give me the grace to see her through Your eyes and to always regard her as forgiven, and the strength to love and serve her well._ He feels the words with such fervency that he is nearly frantic. So precious, so _unlikely_ is their love, and he is desperate to get it right.

He gets through the vows, but only just, his voice breaking a handful of times as he endeavours to speak round the lump in his throat. She reaches out to wipe the tears from his cheek. This is the dream from which he would always awaken alone, now playing out before his eyes. _I can scarcely breathe now without her. I am more myself with her than ever I've been on my own._

As if to illustrate the point, he holds his breath as she gazes at him, her earnest eyes full of love and promise.

"I, Isobel Fiona Grey, take you, Richard Egan Clarkson, to be my husband, to have and to hold from this day forward; for better, for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death us do part; according to God's holy law. In the presence of God I make this vow."

Mirroring her gesture of moments ago, he runs the backs of his fingers over the velvet of her cheek and catches her tears. "You're incredible," he whispers.

"I love you," she breathes in answer, and in her watery smile, in the faltering breath she takes as she fights for her composure, he hears the truth of her heart. _I was so very wrong to refuse you, to turn you away. I can't take it back, but you will never know pain again. Your joy shall be my joy; your sorrow, my sorrow. All that you are is so precious to me. You're not alone anymore; never alone again._

 _Alone._ Two syllables he despised, that had for so long haunted him whilst all around him, humanity existed in pairs. And now, suddenly, all he can think of is getting her by themselves. Alone.

* * *

A month ago she had asked him —plainly, as was her way— if he would consider wearing a ring for her. "Not in theatre, I mean, of course not. And not at all if you don't want to." Once the question itself was out of her mouth she'd begun to blush and to backtrack.

"Oi," he'd interrupted, leaning in close. He had kissed her with such intensity as to render her speechless, but just for good measure he'd added, "Quiet, woman!" with smiling eyes. And then, suddenly as serious as he'd just been joking, he had fixed her with his eyes and told her, "Nothing would please me more than to wear your ring." _Her_ ring. Because the law, in its antiquated immutability, will declare her _his,_ but he has been hers by entireties, the sum total of all his parts, since 1912.

And how he loves her, now, for her uncontainable spirit; the queen of the rebels stood before God and their cadre of witnesses. Defiance, arrayed impeccably in silk chiffon and lace, glancing surreptitiously at the vicar for his nod; the sweet solemn blink of her eyes as the weight of it is placed in her palm. She may not be able to give him her promise now, but he received it on that distant day in his surgery.

" _I have the adrenalin here in my hand." Trust me; I know what's best. For your patient._ _ **For you.**_

He recalls the unspoken cry of her heart now as he watches her mouth move silently. _With this ring, I thee wed._

They turn towards the vicar a bit, so that their departure from tradition is only witnessed between the three. "I love you," she tells him once again, privately, as she takes his left hand in hers and slides the band onto his finger, smiling tearfully. His hand trembles; for a fraction of a second she twines her fingers through his, squeezing. _I am with you now. Always. I am yours._

The cold metal warms instantly and he nearly laughs aloud at himself because, soppy old git that he's become, he finds himself thinking, _It'll never be cold again._

They adjust their positions and the vicar continues:

 _Bless, O Lord, this Ring,  
that he who gives it and she who wears it may abide in thy peace,  
and continue in thy favour,  
unto their life's end; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen_.

 **It's time.**

He draws a shaky breath and holds her with his gaze.

"Isobel, I give you this ring as a symbol of my vow, and with all that I am, and all that I have, I honour you, in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit." She watches him slip the ring onto her finger, and as it slides home she flexes her fingers and closes her eyes.

 _Finally._

Their hands now joined, they cling to one another, and _yes,_ he decides; marriage does make all the difference. He can hold her hand and she can hold her head high and proud. As it should be.

He should be paying attention to the prayers, but he cannot tear his eyes away from her, breathtaking in the dress she'd seen whilst window shopping in the high street, and had instantly loved, and had subsequently talked herself out of buying. _"I'm too old; you saw the shopgirls giggling! Besides that, it's far too extravagant. There'll only be a handful of us in the church."_

He'd gone back to the dressmaker's on his next day off and had given the proprietor her measurements, along with a piece of his mind regarding the kind of help the man employed. He'd received a sincere, mollified apology and a hundred pound discount off the price of the dress. No matter, that; he'd have given his last tuppence if that's what it had cost him, and the minute he brought it home to her and watched her fall to her knees on his sitting room floor, weeping for joy, he knew he'd made the right choice.

She is radiant. Elegant. Regal. She'd gone on and on about the lay of the fabric, the detailing, the fine handiwork. He didn't understand a word of it but he agrees, now, as she stands before him. The way that the dress nips in just above her waist, the silhouette of the bodice, opaque to the top of her chest and the jut of her shoulder blades. The intricate lace overlay; sheer shoulders and sleeves ( _So much skin!_ Artfully concealed, exquisitely stylish, but sufficiently obvious to the point he's being driven mad). She carries herself with the grace of one who has lived well and loved much and been loved intensely; she has lost everything dear to her and risen from the ashes not once; not even just twice, but three times. She smiles as tears stream down her cheeks and _oh,_ how he longs to take her in his arms and keep her there until the end of time.

She has been watching him watch her, and he feels his ears get hot when their eyes meet. She blushes under his gaze and he stands a little taller. _My beauty; my bride. However bloody long are these prayers? Forgive me, Father, but surely You understand; given the circumstances, I just want to be alone with my wife._

He feels her arm quiver and glances over to catch the telltale signs of her desperate effort to hold back laughter; she knows him too well and his thoughts, it would seem, couldn't be more plain. She shakes her head at him almost imperceptibly, as if to say, _Behave!_

At last he hears the words he has been waiting for:

 _Now that Richard and Isobel have given themselves to each other by solemn vows,  
with the joining of hands and the giving and receiving of a ring,  
I pronounce that they are husband and wife,  
in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit._

 _Those whom God has joined together let no one put asunder. Amen._

He turns to her, and she to him, and it's impossible to discern who initiates the embrace. His long-held composure breaks, and along with it hers, and in a breath he's sobbing into her shoulder as she weeps against his neck. Somehow they have managed to sit down on the edge of the altar (how he did not crumble to his knees and bring her with him is a mystery), and it's her whispers that do him in.

"It's alright …" Soothing him, "Hush, my darling …" Rocking him, "Oh, Richard …" Succumbing to the apogee of emotion. What it all means, at last. "My God … my God, you're my husband! Oh, my love … my love ..."

 **At last.**

"My wife," he breathes in answer, raising his head. He sniffs, lifts her chin to make her meet his eyes. His lower lip trembles, her cheek resting in his palm as he stutter-sobs. "My beautiful wife."

Smiling beatifically, she reaches for the handkerchief in the inside pocket of his suit coat, dabbing at his eyes and then her own.

The vicar crouches down in front of them. "Is everyone quite alright?" he asks with genuine concern.

Richard opens his mouth to answer and finds he can say nothing. She reaches for his hand, wraps her fingers around his, nods and smiles. Swallows hard and answers for them. "This has been a _very_ long time coming. All is well; only we find ourselves a bit overcome now it's finally happened."

The man has known Richard a little. Not details, but knows him to be a good man, devoted to his profession and well respected in the community. Any woman who can turn his attention away from the surgery must surely be a force in her own right. "Might I ask how long?"

They glance at one another and Richard realises that they're doing it: the thing that married people do; one answering questions on behalf of them both.

It's his turn this time. "Since before the War." The vicar's eyes widen momentarily; Isobel's eyes go soft, cataloguing the years between that fateful day and this.

"The timing was never right," she adds, "or when it was, one of us was always wrong." He notices she doesn't say, 'one or the other of us.' She does not hesitate to confess that it was she who kept them apart, though now he reckons he was _wrong_ just as much of the time as she.

"No matter the reason, you've found your way forward together at last," says the vicar with a smile. "Your devotion to one another is as plain as day. I am reminded of the word of the Lord spoken through the prophet Joel:

"' _I will restore to you the years that the locust hath eaten.'_ Never lament the time you fear you've lost, the years you could have had. You will have those years. Whereas before, you wouldn't have been prepared; now you know how to carry one another, come what may."

Richard and Isobel hold one another's eyes, astonished. This man, however kind, doesn't know them from Adam, and yet his words are specifically _for them._ Richard has always been wary of the notion of the Lord speaking through any means other than the Word itself, but the past several months have made him a believer in all sorts of things he'd previously put down to folly, so who is he to reject the possibility out of hand?

He rises on shaky legs, and, holding his hands out to her, helps her to her feet. They thank the vicar, sharing a meaningful look between them. There are more pressing matters at hand, but they must soon revisit this very personal blessing of their union.

* * *

She shares a teary embrace with Mary as they are leaving the church, saying their goodbyes. Neither woman speaks Matthew's name; Isobel expresses her gratitude to Mary for her presence and for George's, makes mention of wanting to see the girls soon. But the words are there in Mary's eyes, uncharacteristically soft. _He would have been so very happy for you both._

She is quiet as they walk to the car, her arm looped through his, and by her measured breaths he knows she is holding tightly to her control. He huffs a laugh at himself, at her, the situation. Their first time appearing in public as husband and wife and the streets are empty. Accordingly, when they reach the car, he stops her.

"Isobel." Her name, half-whispered, leaves his lips reverently. His fingertips trail downwards from the inside of her elbow, slowly stroking over the lace of her sleeve, painstakingly making their way to her wrist as she watches. Her eyes lock upon his when he lifts her hand, pressing his lips to the pulse point at the base of her wrist. He sucks at the delicate skin for the briefest of moments and she mewls.

"My wife," he breathes in wonder, tugging on the hand he still holds, bringing her toe-to-toe with him. His arms encircle her waist, one palm pressing into the small of her back, his knuckles running upwards, to the base of her neck, and then back down, tracing the row of buttons, soothing and enticing.

"My husband," she answers, her voice hushed and brimming with amazement, "my _husband!"_ Her own hands gain purchase at his waistcoat, her palms, warm and sure, slipping between it and his suit coat, pressing against the satin fabric at his back.

"My darling." Angling his head ever so slightly, he leans in, his purpose clear. As the tip of his nose nudges hers, he hears the anticipatory hitch in her breath, feels her chest expand and subsequently not contract. The corner of his upper lip brushes the centre of her lower and she whimpers into his mouth.

It's a sound he will remember for the remainder of his days. The way her arms draw him nearer, her hands grasping at his shoulder blades as his mouth descends upon hers at last.

They kiss unhurriedly, but it's all soft and chaste. Until the very end, that is, when he presses her against the door of the car and his teeth scrape ever so gently against her bottom lip.

"Richard!" she gasps, sotto voce, and it's halfway between admonition and encouragement. Anyone at all could come upon them kissing in the street like unscrupulous youths.

He grins against her mouth. "My love, I reckon I've earned the right, long as I've waited for this moment." He kisses her again and she doesn't chastise him.

Instead her lips brush the outside of his ear and her fingers curl in his collar as she whispers, "That's as may be, but what I've got in mind isn't something I'm keen to share with anyone but you. _My husband."_

He gapes at her a long moment and she smiles, raising a pretty eyebrow in silent provocation.

Yet again he is transported back to days of old, only this time the outcome works in her favour.

 _Game, set, and match ... to Mrs. Clarkson._

* * *

 **Oh, but there are such big pieces of my heart in here. Oof.**


	13. Home to me

**A/N: Aaaand that's a wrap. In some ways it feels entirely wrong to post this now. On the other hand, I know I sure need to be distracted from the world that is coming to an end all around us. It is in that spirit that I sat down and finally finished this fic. I'd warn you all of the NSFW-ness of this chapter, but, um, who even _is_ working right now?**

 **Your support throughout the duration of this story has been amazing. I cannot thank you enough. Please be well, friends. Be safe. Stay HOME.**

 **xx,**  
 **~ejb~**

* * *

Anticipation hangs heavy on the drive back to his cottage. _Their_ cottage. A home now, truly, in every sense of the word.

He'd lit the match with that kiss in the street, so that by the time he had handed her into the car and arranged himself in the driver's seat, her eyes were dark with need.

"Isobel?" he asks, but he knows. Watches her graceful fingers creep up the length of his jacket sleeve. Closes his eyes as he feels the tug, her hands grasping his lapels. Her breath, warm and sweet, kisses his lips, and then … Her mouth. _Sweet Lord, her mouth._ Her kiss is playful at the start: open-mouthed; tiny breaths against his lips, nipping with the edges of her teeth, _just_ making contact. If she's not cottoned on yet to the fact that this drives him mad, she's soon to learn.

He moans deep into her mouth and takes her lips with force, his palm at the base of her neck, fingertips teasing the wispy curls at her nape.

She presses closer, cradling his face, flicking her tongue at his bottom lip. He _growls._ His arm comes around her waist, pulling her in until he can feel her heartbeat against his chest and crushing his mouth to hers.

They come apart panting; he is dizzy for want of oxygen … and _her._ She looks up at him through her lashes, her lips kiss-bitten. Tucks her face in against his neck a moment, huffs a laugh. This is absurd; it's glorious. Foolhardy and decadent. She nuzzles against the place where his pulse pounds in his throat, kissing her way across his jawline to his ear and whispers two words he never, in all his life, expected to hear:

"Home, husband."

Her hand rests on his thigh as he negotiates the roads. She is testing his mettle, the tip of her index finger traversing the inside leg seam of his trousers. She glances up at him from time to time, her face a tableau of thrilling dichotomy: her wide eyes innocent; the barest hint of a wicked grin tugging at the corners of her lips. He is sucking air through clenched teeth, his grasp on the steering wheel so forceful that his knuckles have gone white. When her thumb sweeps the crease where his hip and thigh meet, his rhythm on the foot pedals falters and he lurches the car into reverse.

She shrieks, clutching his forearm as he throws the handbrake, grinding the car to an abrupt halt. It's on the tip of his tongue to chastise her; he can see in her expression that she's expecting a tongue-lashing. Instead he is overcome by a fit of laughter. It wells up from deep within and he could no more prevent its escape than stop the sun from shining.

She steals a glance at him and he pulls her close. "Woman, you could have run us off the road," he tells her, chuckling, not a trace of admonition in it.

"Remind me again who started this," comes her rejoinder as she fixes him with a look that makes his knees weak.

"Well played, sir." He kisses the arch of her eyebrow. "Even so, you must learn to keep your hands to yourself."

She giggles melodically. "That is one thing you can rest assured I'll never do." He raises an eyebrow at her now, and she rolls her eyes, arranging herself primly on the bench seat beside him, her head resting on his shoulder. "Better?" She glances up at him from beneath her lashes.

He nods. "It'll do." Then, reaching for her hand, he links her arm through his. "There. Perfect."

* * *

He fumbles with the key long enough that she huffs, wrestles it out of his grasp and opens the door herself. In his defence he's been a bit distracted; he'd helped her from the car and she'd seized her chance and kissed him as he was pulling her to her feet. From there she'd walked him backwards towards the front door, pulling off his hat and bow tie, pressing kisses to his mouth and throat, the tender place behind his ear.

He retaliates by catching her about the waist as she's about to cross the threshold and lifting her into his arms. When she opens her mouth to ask what the hell he's doing, he kisses her deftly into silence. "I've been waiting all my life to do this. Surely you wouldn't deny me the chance." Her head falls back and she laughs as he carries her through the door. He kisses her throat, lingering over the pulse point, she still cradled against him, and when at last he sets her down she is quick to close the door behind them, getting him between her body and the smooth, hard wood. Much like the night he'd first kissed her, when she'd been an eager recipient of his ardour until her patience wore thin, she presses him against the door now, her hands at his nape drawing him towards her, palms flattened to smooth over his shoulders and down his chest. She angles her head, blinking heavily at him.

"Richard," she breathes. He is knocked for six by the awe in her voice. That she has longed for this like he does; that she loves him as thoroughly as he loves her.

Her lips brush his and he forgets to think, forgets everything but the feel of her hands on him, the sweet, needy sound she makes in the back of her throat when his tongue touches hers. He reaches for her hips, manoeuvres her to stand between his legs, pulls her flush against him. He's been hard since he backed her up against the car door, and he's not going to try to hide it or feign concern for her delicate sensibilities any longer.

Especially not when she responds to the feel of him against her with a deep, "Mmmm," into his mouth, resonant through her chest where their bodies touch.

He briefly entertains the notion of having her against the door, reckons by her enthusiasm that she might be game. But in all his dreams of this moment she's always laid out amidst cool sheets, every beautiful inch of bare skin a veritable feast for his ravenous eyes; hands; mouth.

Her own small hands bring the moment back into sharp focus, insistently tugging at his braces, the flies of his trousers, her teeth dragging across his bottom lip.

He envelops her hands and holds them down by her sides. She makes a discontented sound and looks at him with a question in her eyes. He raises her hands to his lips and presses a heated kiss to the inside of each wrist. "Let me take you to bed," he murmurs.

She huffs a laugh. "Right. But I'll walk there under my own power, thank you." He answers her with a raised brow and she elaborates, "It won't do for you to throw your back out before the wedding night!"

He frowns for a fraction of a second, his pride injured slightly; he'd like her to think —would like for the both of them to believe— that he could carry her to bed with ease, the staircase and his sixty-eight years notwithstanding.

But before he has the chance she turns on her heel and makes for the stairs, the fabric of her dress skimming the curve of her bum as she begins to ascend. On the fourth riser she looks back at him over her shoulder and his jaw drops. She appears at once magisterial —the elegance of her form, the extravagance of the dress— and debauched —her lips swollen, pupils dilated, chest heaving with each breath.

"Aren't you coming?" she asks him. Innocent and cunning and wonderful and his _._

"Not until you've done," he answers with a sly grin. Now it is she who gapes at him, and he watches as she shudders, a shiver running the length of her spine. She turns, continuing her journey up the stairs with him on her heels, her hips swaying enticingly.

Once inside their bedroom, he slams the door shut. She looks at him and they both break out in laughter, and then he's turning her, placing her palms against the door as he goes to work on the row of buttons at her back.

His lips descend on the base of her neck. The softest skin he has ever encountered; yielding to his mouth, arching into his touch. "Richaaaard," she complains. _Why are we still clothed?_

"So. Damned. Many. Buttons," he apologises, each word punctuated by a kiss.

"Just get it off!" she commands, her fingertips worrying the grain of the wood, itching to touch him.

He grins at her flustered directive. "But your dress, darling."

"I don't care! I'll have it repaired. Please!"

Fortunately the last of the buttons are loosed before he has to resort to ripping the garment off of her. He skims his hands down her back, over her hips as he guides her out of the dress, draping it over the chair by the window. Perhaps one day it will be of interest to Mary's girls, or George's wife. He sees the softness in her eyes, watching him as he turns back to her. Comprehension; gratitude; a touch of wistfulness. He feels it in her touch: warm palms cradling his face; in her kiss: soft and lingering.

"You were so beautiful today," he tells her in a whisper against her cheek. She stands before him now in brassiere and girdle, lace stockings and heels. So warm; so soft; so very nearly bare. He can see her heart beating beneath her skin. "You are _so beautiful,_ my love."

She moves against him, hands in his hair sliding down to his shoulders. "I _want_ you," she tells him. Surging towards him, closer still; the slide of her tongue against his own: so certain, so hungry. Nimble fingers finally undoing his braces, opening his shirt, rucking up his vest in their quest for bare skin. "Help me," she implores him, pulling at his shirtsleeves.

He gives a quiet exhalation of amusement and kisses her hard on the mouth. "Easy now. There's no hurry." He unbuttons his cuffs and tosses his shirt to the floor. She looks at him for permission and when he nods, raising his arms, she peels his vest off over his head. His trousers and socks join the pile and he kneels before her in nothing but his shorts. Lifting each foot in turn, he removes her shoes and then pauses to gaze at her in her underthings. He unfastens her garters and rolls each stocking down slowly, trained on her response as he kisses behind her knees, running his tongue up the insides of her thighs. He can smell her excitement, the heat of her, as he presses his face to her mound.

"Oh!" she yelps, _"ohh,"_ as he nuzzles her. She runs her fingers through his hair and he closes his eyes against the sensation. The knowledge that she is _here._ In his arms, touching him. That she now wears his ring, shares his bed, has given herself to him. Nearly a third of his life spent longing for her to the exclusion of everything else, and he could just as easily have spurned her attentions and missed this moment forever.

There is a question in her eyes as he lifts himself upwards, but he shakes his head in answer. "I love you," he breathes as he sets to work opening hooks until her girdle falls away and he presses his mouth to her belly through the fabric of her knickers. Muscles ripple under her skin, her breath draws sharply inwards. He hooks his thumbs in the waistband, slowly peeling the garment off, latching his mouth to one freshly exposed hipbone and blazing a trail with his tongue to the other. Her gasps of surprise, the tightening of her fingers on his scalp tell him to linger and he does, kissing his way down to the shadowy patch of curls at her centre.

"Isobel." He says her name as a means of asking for her eyes. When her gaze is locked upon his own, he leans in closer and lets the tip of his tongue slip past his lips to flick the tiny nub of flesh at the heart of her pleasure.

She gasps sharply and clutches at his head. His hands push gently at the insides of her knees, encouraging her to widen her stance. She complies without delay and then his hands are on her hips, palms planted against her upper thighs. "Look at me, darling," he urges once more and when she does, he slides his thumbs over her sex, finding her hot and wet and swollen, opening her to him and holding her there.

She is breathless, strung tight as he watches, waits. Her mouth forms the silent syllables: _Oh, Christ,_ and he brushes against her with the pad of his thumb. _"Please!"_ she cries. At last he kisses her there.

He is gentle and she is _perfect,_ bearing down against his mouth. "Oh, God, Richard … _Yes!"_ she cries when he dares to delve inside her with his tongue. He works her over and over, lapping at her like a man starved until she is trembling, the muscles of her inner thighs quivering. At last he grants her reprieve, applying his lips, the flat of his tongue to the little bundle of nerves and suckling, soft but merciless. Soon she is crying out above him, bucking hard against his face and squeezing him with her thighs. Her sex flutters against his tongue; he latches on hard once more and she comes apart in his mouth. The taste of her, the sight and sound and feel nearly have him coming in his shorts, but still he kisses her, slipping his finger inside and curling it upwards, drawing out her pleasure.

She tugs at his hair and he grins against her oversensitised sex, biting down gently on the fleshy part of her inner thigh and sucking hard enough to mark her. He lets her help him to his feet and kicks off his shorts, and then she pushes at his chest, her arm going round his waist as he tumbles onto the bed, bringing her with him. It is only as she comes to rest above him, her thighs straddling his hips, the tickle of coarse hair between her legs and the heat of her pressing against his belly, that he realises he neglected to strip her of her brassiere.

"This won't do," he rumbles. Their eyes meet as he cradles her breasts in his palms. She moans deliciously and arches into his hands, her nipples pebbling beneath the final barrier between her skin and his. Lifting away from him a moment, she braces up on her knees, reaching behind herself to open the clasp between her shoulder blades.

"Take it off," she whispers, watching his eyes as she lowers herself to him again and he lifts his hands to her shoulders, slipping the straps slowly down her arms. He watches her shiver, gooseflesh rising on her upper arms, her nipples peaking sharply.

"Not cold?" he asks, teasing, pulling her closer.

She shakes her head. Bites her lip. Stares at him. He can see her heart beating wildly as he lifts his head and draws her breast into his mouth. He catches her nipple between the roof of his mouth and his tongue and laps at her, circles the aching bud. Kisses her gently until she's panting, then bites down softly on a mouthful of rounded flesh. Her hips are circling madly; she is thick and damp and _hot,_ so close to him yet still too far away.

As if sensing his thoughts, she raises up, knelt above him so that her wetness brushes the base of his erection. She moves a hand between them to align herself with him and slips against his length.

He hisses, clutching at her, his hands slipping down, palming the globes of her arse. She drops her head, eyes squeezing shut, and lets him direct the motion of her hips.

"Good," she breathes, and lowers herself to her forearms, braced on his chest. Her lips trail over his neck, nipping at the pulse in his throat, meandering across his shoulders, placing open-mouthed kisses where his heart beats.

"Yes!" He barks as she sinks her teeth into him there. It's a surprise of the most wondrous kind, as are the next words to leave her mouth.

"You are _mine,_ Richard Clarkson."

He levels her with a look, the entirety of their history written in his eyes. "Always have been," he tells her, aligning their bodies. His eyes dark and desperate, he strokes himself a few times as she watches.

"My God," she breathes, and holds to his shoulders as she slowly takes him inside her.

Her skin is soft as silk, his hands on her hips holding her, steadying her, as she adjusts to the length and breadth of him. He loves the feeling of stretching her.

He's not the only one. He pushes up into her a little; deep, deeper, and watches her ribs retract as her breath draws sharply inwards. "Yes," she whispers, her eyes drifting shut; head thrown back, the long tender column of her throat exposed. She holds him, just holds him, completely still, within her. He _throbs._ They are throbbing together, the temptation to drive into her nearly killing him. His palms smooth upwards, over her back, pressing into her shoulder blades, drawing her down to him.

Eighteen years of love, his raised eyebrows and her raised ire. Admiration for the brilliant medical mind that lay within the beauty who could turn his head with just one glance. Who could set his blood to boiling with the tap of her pen against his patient's chart, with the words, "When I practised in Manchester …" They have each been to the end of themselves, with one another. _For_ one another.

"Have you any idea," he asks her, breathlessly, punctuated with a kiss, "how long I've waited for you?" He kisses her lips, her jawline as he arches up into her.

He catches her on the back foot and she gasps. Before she can answer him, he latches onto her left breast and suckles her, slow and deep. In response her sex flutters around him, squeezing him. "You've got me, my darling," she pants at last, cradling his face. He is hers, utterly; completely, and nothing has made him feel prouder in all his life than when she declared him so. Nothing, that is, until she tells him, "I am yours. Only _yours."_

When she raises up to take him, he follows and kisses her nipples, the soft place between her breasts. His lips move over her throat and then he pauses. Their eyes meet and he curls his fingers against her scalp.

"I love you," he tells her, as if it's the first time the thought has occurred to him. Perhaps it _is_ a fresh revelation of sorts: loving her has so little to do with him and everything to do with her; not because of what she does for him, but rather who she _is_.

She laughs, a joyous sound, sweet huff of breath against his mouth, and kisses him long and slow as she begins to move. "My darling," she calls him as she rocks herself above him. "My husband … my love," as though she knows. As if, like him, she can scarcely believe it. To have longed for one another for so very many years: life and death and even war simultaneously coming between them, driving them onward; forward, together. Apart. And now, at last, bound to one another. Against all odds, unto death.

He is powerless beneath her, mesmerised by her heat, her cries, the undulations of her beautiful body as she rises up and away from him and then sinks back down. She takes him by surprise as her hips flex and she works him somehow deeper still.

"There," he grunts, and palms her bum. Holds her fast. "Christ, Isobel. Right _there!"_

"Yes!" Poised above him, strung tight and impossibly soft, she is a dizzying paradox of "all things bright and beautiful," he thinks. And then she circles her hips and all capacity to do anything but feel is lost. He moves in counterpoint and together they find a rhythm, lush and tender.

 _This_ is intimacy: the wanton purity with which she moves; breathes; blinks at him, incredulously, as she feels and _feels_ and comes up short of words with which to quantify it. The definitive way in which she has placed her trust in him.

He catches her eyes, kisses the pad of his thumb, draws it down her midline to the bundle of nerves at her centre.

"Ohh!" she breathes, clenching hard around him as he begins to stroke her gently. He watches her reactions, the deepening of her breaths, the way her nipples stand in stark relief when he finds the spot, the pressure that she needs.

 _Beauty,_ he thinks, and, _mine._ He takes his time with her, bringing her to the edge and then backing her down again and again. It thrills him to witness the juxtaposition of her in the dominant position, still certainly holding him captive, yet doing so by yielding to his control.

He taps his thumb on her clitoris so lightly that he's hardly touching her at all, but it's exactly what she needs.

" _That's_ it, beauty." He feels her tightening around him like a vise, the long, suspended, breathless fluttering, and hears her frantic cry:

"Please, Richard! Oh, God, _please!"_

His hips snap sharply upwards and then he stills the both of them. Stroking her with painstaking tenderness, he bites down on her earlobe, then whispers, "Come now, Isobel."

Her back arches; her palms brace against his chest. _"Ohhh …"_ She keens long and low, letting him watch her, the moment she breaks and her eyes go beautifully unfocused. "I love you!" she breathes, practically soundless. "I love you! I love you!"

"Beautiful," he marvels aloud. "So bloody beautiful."

He lets her recover, holding tightly to her hips to keep him inside her as he lays her down. He is peppering her neck and the tops of her breasts with kisses when he feels her fingers running lightly through his hair.

"Yes," she murmurs, laughing low and wicked, seductive. "My God, husband … yes."

He nuzzles her nose with his, kisses her hungrily. "I'll never tire of hearing you call me that." He grins, brushing the backs of his fingers across her cheek.

She smiles beautifully up at him. "And I'll always get a thrill from being called _your wife."_

He raises a playful eyebrow and settles deeper into the cradle of her hips. "A _thrill,_ aye?"

She nods, shuddering pleasurably as she leans up to kiss him, her legs opening wider to him in welcome. "Come on. I want you."

 _Mother of God,_ he thinks as he begins to move. _Never stop, will you? Please just never stop._ She is heaven; she is home; she is beauty untold, crying out in delight as he takes her hard and deep, her legs wrapped round his waist, heel drumming against his arse. Slick. Tight. Hot. _Mine. You're mine._ _ **My**_ _wife. Oh, Christ. Oh, fuck. Oh … Isobel!_

* * *

She is kissing him softly all over his face, smoothing sweat-damp hair back off his brow when he returns to himself. "I'll never stop wanting you, husband, my love," he hears her soothe, and comes back to her with a kiss, long and deep. She moans into it and his hips roll against her one more time. She reaches for him as aftershocks course through them both.

"Hmph," she grumbles as he softens, slipping from her. She lies on her back, one arm folded behind her head, as he settles on his side, turned towards her.

"Not to worry, darling," he tells her, smoothing his palm across her belly, delighting in the twitch of her muscles at his touch. "There's plenty more where that came from."

She giggles, wrapping her arms around him. "I plan on holding you to it," she breathes hot in his ear, "but for the moment I'll settle for _you_. Holding _me."_ With a pointed look she adds, "Never stop, will you?"

A stricken look crosses his face. "Did I—?"

She nods vigorously against the pillow, grinning. "Yes, you're rather vocal when we're … like this."

"Oh, Isobel, I'm—" _Sorry,_ he'd been going to say, but the press of her finger against his lips silences him.

"Have you any idea how it feels to know you want me in that way? You've given me life again, Richard. I may have been living before but I wasn't alive." He understands. After Matthew, she had become but a shell of her former, always vivacious, sometimes vitriolic, self. It had nearly killed him to watch the woman he loved, who had always been enduringly vibrant, fade into shadow. "Don't ever apologise, you wonderful man. I'm alive, and I'm in love. And it's all because of you."

He feels the sting of tears and watches as her eyes well up too, but there's a nagging thought that won't leave him alone. She had proclaimed him _vocal,_ had clearly heard the plea he'd intended to go unspoken that she _never stop._ And now that his faculties are back in working order, he recalls having had... _other_ thoughts in the haze of sex. Isobel is not proud; he's known her to be as comfortable elbow-deep in the abdominal cavity of a patient as dressed to the nines in silk charmeuse trading barbs with Lady Grantham across the dinner table. Still, if he'd said _that_ aloud … He wouldn't dream of using such vulgar language in her presence, especially not whilst—

"I love the way you make me feel," she is saying, oblivious to his disquietude. "I love the way you kiss me, the way you touch me." Her fingertips graze her collarbone, drifting downwards over the tender skin between her breasts. "And I particularly love the way that you …" She whispers the rest in his ear.

It makes him feel … _things._ Relief, to begin with. Only she would so readily absolve him of such effrontery. He can't recollect having ever heard her utter anything baser than the occasional _damn,_ so to say that he's gobsmacked is not an exaggeration. But more than all of that, he feels the crackling of embers; matchlight flames lick at his skin, coiling deep in his belly. He groans softly.

"What's the matter, my love?" She smooths her hand from his shoulder, down his flank and his eyes squeeze shut at the sensation. The gravity of their circumstance keeps knocking him for six. This is _Isobel._ The woman he has wanted, whom he has loved for so very many years, yet who would never belong to him. And now she is bare beside him, touching him. Telling him that she loves him too, _wants_ him too. She is his wife, his _wife._ _ **His. Wife.**_

He answers her with a kiss. "You, my beauty _,_ are a temptress, and if I were a younger man I'd have you under me again in a heartbeat." He sighs deeply. "Alas, the spirit is willing …"

She chuckles sympathetically. "Oh, husband, we've got _time."_ She takes his breath away. Sated, heavy-lidded, smiling contentedly. Such confidence behind those words. He curls his body around hers, treasuring the satisfied sound she makes as he gathers her against him.

He can't resist touching her, tracing patterns on her bare shoulder, skimming his palm over her belly, caressing her breasts. She groans softly, wiggles against him, whispers low how good it feels.

 _I was a fool to let you go,_ he thinks _. How did I live without this?_ He feels his limbs grow heavy, fights to keep his eyes open. She is losing the battle as well; he can tell by her stillness, the deep, even breaths that press her back against his chest.

"Richard?"

He registers her voice through the syrupy haze. "Yes, love."

"You once told me you had a feeling that you and I would sink or swim together."

He smiles into her hair. "I remember it vividly."

She turns over to face him. "At the risk of sounding trite, you kept me from drowning. It was always you, pulling me away from the cliff edge." Her facial expressions cycle through the entire spectrum of emotion. "Until I pushed back so hard that you let me go."

His mouth drops open. "I ju— … I—"

She cups his chin in her palm. "Shh, no." Kisses his lips. "It was never about your taking a step wrong. It's that you loved me when I was positively wretched. Sink or swim, no?"

He grins and turns his head, kisses the centre of her palm. "Aye," he rasps, unable to keep the emotion out of his voice, "aye. But you're not the only one was saved. I always knew you were in my corner, even when we couldn't spare a glance at one another without a row breaking out. Knowing you were with me, that I had an ally. I'm not sure you're aware of what that meant to me. What it means now."

She looks upon him with soft eyes. "It means I love you. Always."

He tries to speak but can't get round the lump that has formed in his throat. He swallows hard, blinking against the sting of tears, and finally tells her, "Then I've all I ever wanted."

She leans in close, smooths back his hair, peppers his face with tiny kisses. No more words are said as she gathers him against her. Her chest against his back, her knees behind his own, his bum resting in the cradle of her hips, her palm pressed firmly where his heart beats.

For better. For worse.  
Adversity and prosperity.  
Love. Honour. Cherish.

Sink or swim.

* * *

 **P.S.: Oh yes I did. I went there. I really couldn't care less about the fandom war that broke out several years ago over the use of that word. It has its place, even among the most conservative of marriage beds.**


End file.
